I want to propose a modified version of the motion that is currently before the House.
Yes, I am trying to reinvent the wheel, but this is providing an alternative so that if in the vote today we vote against the motion, there is an alternative motion before us and an alternative path.
That said, here is our motion:
That pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) the Committee receive a briefing from the analysts and report its findings and recommendations to the House as regards the study on the Canadian response to the outbreak of the coronavirus that it had undertaken in the 1st session of the 43rd Parliament; and that the Committee then commence a study on the emergency situation facing Canadians in light of the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, and that this study evaluate, review and examine all issues relevant to this situation. The initial 5 topics that shall be studied will be determined by each party submitting a ranked list of their top 5 priority study areas to the clerk by October 27th at 5 p.m. so that he can prepared a ranked list. Each party will be entitled to one witness per one hour witness panel, and two witnesses per two hour witness panel; and that we request pertinent documents, topic by topic, after hearing from witnesses and ascertaining which documents are relative to a productive study of the issue.
I think that the issue in the change regarding what documents would be required is an important change to what has been proposed in the motion that is on the floor.
Certainly we have heard a lot of discussion from various interest groups, various manufacturers, about the implications of the motion that is before the House. This would allow us to tailor the request for documents topic by topic. That is important. For example, in the motion before the House there are provisions to protect things like contractual obligations with respect to vaccines; however, that doesn't seem to be there with respect to PPE, and certainly there was concern by manufacturers that the motion before the House could lead to revealing contractual details between companies and companies that have done a lot of work to refit their plants in order to make PPE.
There is also some concern about trade secrets being revealed, so when it comes to PPE we may want to have a slightly different request from the government in terms of what documents are required.
Similarly, on the issue of vaccines and the documents required in relation to vaccine deals that the government has made with other countries, there is a lot more concern there about contractual details being revealed and possibly harming our ability to access the vaccines, which everybody knows is essential to our getting out of this deep hole we are in as a result of COVID.
There is another concern with respect to procuring documents regarding vaccines and redactions. There will be redactions, even based on the motion before the House. There will be redactions from that material, but that is going to be problematic, because, as a lot of you know, there are a lot of conspiracy theories hovering around vaccines, some really crazy stuff. I've heard seemingly intelligent people telling me that they believed the virus was developed by Microsoft and we will have a vaccine that will inject little microchips into people. This is a crazy idea, but a lot of people believe this, so as soon as you produce all these documents from the government with respect to vaccines and there are these blacked-out segments, there will be a lot of concern and people are going to read into this: “What are they hiding from us? They are hiding something.”
The current motion before the House seeks to procure a vast number of documents. This is a war. We are in a war against COVID, and we don't want to do anything wrong.
I think the current request for documents is problematic, and we're hearing about it from companies. It is probably in all of our best interests to try to refine it, hone it down a bit, and because of that, I'm putting out my motion as an alternative path.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.