—“given the chair made a unilateral decision to cancel the meeting on October 10, 2024, then called a meeting with less than”. After the word “the”, it would add “chair adhere to the”. It would strike out the words “the committee members” and replace them with “or”. It would strike out the words “and respect a minimum 48-hour notice period, while adhering, as much as possible, to the committee's usual schedule.”
The revised motion would read, “That the chair adhere to the usual practice of 48 hours of notice during a constituency week without consulting other parties or request that the chair consult and obtain the consensus of the parties for calling meetings during constituency weeks.”
This amendment would be consistent with Standing Order 106(4). It wouldn't seek to violate the rules of the House. It would require a 48-hour notice period or the agreement of the parties to proceed.
It would address what some have claimed to be the motivating issue here. I don't think it is the motivating issue, but it would address what some have claimed to be the motivating issue without creating a procedure that would make it entirely impossible to hold meetings outside of the narrow confines of what the House gives us during sitting weeks.
On the substance of this, we have tight constraints during sitting weeks, especially as it relates to House resources, and we've seen how this plays out. The constituency weeks provide some time and some opportunity when we're not under the same resource constraints.
I think this is a reasonable amendment. It's frustrating, because, if we had been approached in advance of this meeting, if we had set aside some committee time and if we had worked it out, we could have gone back and forth and gotten to this much earlier.
I'll put forward that amendment now. Again, I wish we were hearing from the witnesses, but the amendment is there, and we'll see how people react to it. I don't know if there's a way of bringing it home, so to speak.