Thank you for giving me the floor, Madam Chair. I was somewhat surprised by Mr. Carrie's remarks about the Bloc Québécois in this matter. I asked him to refer to the type of questions that were asked. They were always very clear and always directed at two things. The first involved understanding the sequence of events to see whether things could have been done differently in order to avoid disagreement and disappointment on the part of people who have submitted proposals for building new vaccine manufacturing facilities. The second aspect addressed was what will happen to the funds that the Gates Foundation and the government had put on the table for building those facilities. That is what our questions have always been about.
We decided to agree to hold this third meeting for the sole purpose of getting clarification from the Public Health Branch and from the Minister of Health to find out what will become of the funds allocated. At the two previous meetings on this subject, the answers we were given were somewhat vague and amorphous. Today, I am very pleased to have Dr. David Butler-Jones with us and I would like to be able to ask him that question and to do the same with Dr. Plummer. I am asking for the clerk's opinion on that. Is the minister required to accept the invitation and the committee's motion? I think it is more a question of the committee's standing orders that I would like to ask her. If I could get answers to our questions from Dr. David Butler-Jones and Dr. Frank Plummer, I would be entirely satisfied. That is all I had to say.