Thank you, Madam Chair.
In response to the motion presented by Madam Thibault, we, as a government, welcome this intervention. And we think it should be a necessary means by which to further explain how and why the decisions have been made in government and to listen to deputations that have been affected, positively or negatively. We think that is the duty and responsibility of the committee. So we welcome this motion.
Might I suggest just a small amendment to the motion? This would be to assist our chair and our clerk in facilitating the proper arrangement of witnesses and other considerations.
In the motion, where it says, “during the next”, I would just delete “during the next” and in place of that put “for”. This way it doesn't totally hog-tie us to the next two meetings, when the chair might have witnesses already scheduled. I'm suggesting that we recognize the urgency for the opposition members of dealing with this. And we're suggesting that at the first steering committee meeting we'll be able to work out an acceptable arrangement whereby witnesses and scheduling of this would be available for everybody to examine with the proper diligence.