Before Mr. Albas carries on with the rest of his remarks, I just want to say that on that point, which was a procedural point, I agree completely. I was not appealing to the chair to try to have a vote. If there are members around the table who want to continue to speak, that is their right under the rules. I will certainly support that at this table. I was appealing to other members of the committee that we might have a vote, not to the chair.
What is important to recognize is that to the extent that we take more time to debate these matters as opposed to letting the committee come to a decision—whatever is going to emerge from the vote—that's time we're spending debating how to proceed with the study rather than proceeding with the study itself.
My preference is not to spend the time debating how we study, but to spend the time studying. If other members feel that it's important to continue with this debate, that, of course, is their right. I will be happy to support that right. I will be happy to hear their arguments, or at least I will hear them.
However, I think it is important that the committee come to a decision. If we're not allowed to have the vote because members want to continue to debate the point, what that means is that a decision is effectively being made. We're deciding to have less time to study the bill than to have more time to study the bill, or, through continuous debate, we're deciding not to deal with the bill at all.
If this conversation is going to last until the end of June, then we're going to have the situation of the bill not going through committee at all. If we're going to run this debate until May 20, then we're going to have used up a lot of valuable time that we could spend studying the bill by debating how we're going to study the bill.
To me, it is worthwhile to be able to decide these questions, by which I mean have a vote. Of course, I get it that other members may disagree, and they may want to use the time in other ways. They have every right to do that. No one's questioning their right to do that. I'm questioning whether it's the right thing to do, which is, of course, a very different thing.
I just want to be clear on that point. I thank Mr. Albas, and you, Mr. Chair, for allowing me the time to be clear on that point.