Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I was not a member of this committee in the previous Parliament. However, I was a member of the government operations committee, a rookie member, that very first day when we came to elect our chair and vice-chairs and go through routine proceedings. I recall very clearly coming up to this particular issue and simply raising the question as to why it would not make sense for at least one government member to be present. The rest of the committee agreed that just from a common sense perspective, if we look at this from the average Canadian voter seeing that there are hearings being held and not even one government member is present, when the opposition has that privilege.... This isn't a matter of controlling anything. One government member isn't going to stop or stymie the witnesses, but it just makes sense that a government member should be present to hear the witnesses.
So this is a common sense amendment. This has nothing to do with political motivation. I'm convinced of that.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.