Great, thank you, Mr. Chair.
I think what I have to offer will actually assist in one respect: it will clarify to an extent a small concern about the extent to which we are committing in advance to move forward in the fall on the exact same motion adopted in the House on June 18. I think that's absolutely in the spirit of everything I've heard from Tom. I want to suggest an amendment that makes it even clearer.
In suggesting this amendment I think I'm probably helping on the point by Mr. Lamoureux as well, because my amendment makes it exceptionally clear that in the motion of June 18, the provision “examine the subject-matter of the motions, standing in the name of the Member for Papineau, placed on the Order Paper on June 10, 2013” will be part of the study. This will be made even clearer by my amendment.
What I'd like to do now is just to read the amendment. Tom's motion would stand exactly as is, and then I would suggest simply adding these words:
and that the Committee further show respect for the will of the House by instructing the Chair of the Committee to write to the Government House Leader to request that he, on the first day of the return of the House, seek unanimous consent from the House to bring back the House order of June 18 2013, in the exact form adopted on that day.
I think this is a good idea procedurally, because we are going to have prorogation—it's almost certain—between now and when we'll be able to really study this. In that case I think it's really a good idea to have the exact same motion back before this committee, and the mechanism I'm suggesting here would accomplish that.
At the same time, it absolutely makes clear something that is possibly just a little bit too general in the first three lines of Mr. Lukiwski's motion. The first three lines talk about holding meetings pursuant to the House order regarding transparency and accountability, but then it says, “and that the Committee show respect for the will of the House”, and it only specifies paragraph (h). The idea of showing respect for the will of the House with respect to including a non-recognized party member is really important, but it's isolating one element of the motion, whereas the first three lines are quite general. All I am doing, I think, is crossing the t’s and dotting the i's with what we've exactly heard already from Tom, that the government is in support of the motion as adopted.
I would like to add the extra procedural boost by asking you, the chair, to write to the House leader to ask him to seek unanimous consent when we return.