Thank you. I am covering for my whip. I've been told by him not to ask any questions, but I'm going to ask one anyway.
I expect, Mr. Chair, that you'll protect my parliamentary privilege.
I'll declare a bit of a personal conflict. Perhaps Mr. Bard can help with this, as well. On a number of occasions, other members in my caucus have asked to place a webcam on their computers, both in their constituencies and here, in order to be able to communicate, in some cases with family, especially with young children, and in other cases with their constituents so they actually can see their constituents when they're talking to them. That technology is evolving very rapidly in the sense that it's being used more extensively.
The response was that we couldn't do that, even when we offered to pay for the webcams ourselves. It appeared that there was a security issue around it. I'm having some difficulty with the security argument, because this technology is being widely used in the commercial sector.
I'm wondering what the situation is with that, and if there are any plans to allow members to purchase the webcams, put them on, and make them accessible.
The other point that I would make—having done this in my own residence—is that it's much less expensive. We're not charged for long distance, as we are if it's a regular telephone call and we're going outside of the local area.
For those two reasons, both in terms of our ability to communicate better with our constituents and from a cost vantage point, I'm wondering where we're at with that.