—and I will certainly sprinkle those deserving compliments.
But it's true. There were a lot of compliments about the way you chaired it, because there were no marching orders from anywhere to anyone. We really were independently sitting here as members of Parliament elected by our constituents. We elected you as our chair. You were fair-minded. You moved us through the process, and there was respect. Then we also set our own deadlines, and we made sure as much as possible that we moved along.
I come back again to the beginning, Chair, when I said that the official opposition was trying to indicate good faith by putting in our motion something opposition parties rarely do, because it boxes you in. The government is already playing off it a little in saying that rather than end on that date, we'll start on that date. Again, I'm just pointing out why you don't normally do that: because it gives you political problems.
In this case, what was important to us was to signal to the government—not so much to anybody else, because it's inside baseball—that we're not playing silly buggers here. We're not looking to trap the government into a process where they can't get the bill out. This guaranteed that wouldn't happen, so why would we waste time in March and April not doing constructive things when we built in our own deadline?
Chair, I don't know how we could have sent a more positive signal to the government than this motion that is entirely reasonable. It looked like we were getting somewhere. It looked like there was actually some possibility of movement when the government asked if we would allow them a little time to consider it, and as the trade-off for that consideration, would we consider having the minister.... We started the process. I don't think I'm violating any confidences. People saw it on TV. Tom and I started the discussion, some of it on the floor of the House of Commons and some of it in the hallway outside the House, but we had started. We had even set out the fact that we had until this meeting to get to an agreement, if we could.
We started early. We left ourselves a lot of time. The usual respect that Mr. Lukiwski and I have for each other allowed us to have that discussion. Then, and I don't know why—I won't suggest or impugn motives—all of a sudden I was just informed that, boom, the Conservatives' own version of their iron curtain came down, and there were no more discussions. There was no more consideration of compromise. There was no more consideration of negotiations. It was over, just like that.
That's why I sit here now as much in sadness as in anger, because the real battle, if you want to call it that, the real work, the real discussion, the effort we're putting into this process, should be going into analyzing this mammoth bill that has an incredible impact on our country, on our democracy. If the government believes that they can defend all these changes, we have fair rules in our committee with a chair we respect who evenly applies the rules. We can do that, but it's not just this little committee we're talking about. It's also, how many times will this committee meet? Will those meetings be in public? How many experts will we hear from? Will we have the opportunity to call experts back after we've raised issues? We're suggesting that another reasonable component of those things I've just mentioned is to go to the places in the country where we have concerns that the biggest negative impacts will happen.
The government may win those issues when they come up. One would think that they've thought this through. Our worry is they have thought it through, but they've thought it through for themselves. Fine. Make the arguments that show we're wrong. Make the arguments that tell Canadians it's okay, that they don't need to worry, that the opposition's doing what they do, and it's okay, don't worry.
If they're successful at doing that, then they'll win the day, and people will believe that there were good changes, because at the end of the day, the government's going to get the changes they want. We get that. They have the majority. They have the power. They get to do what they want at the end of the day, but democracy happens in between, and that's the part we're standing up for.
That's why I had hoped there might be a signal from the government, today even, that they're prepared to start some negotiation. I am saying straight up again as clearly as I can that we do not want to get bogged down in a debate on process, but we are not going to let this government steamroll over the rights of the opposition to raise concerns that Canadians rightfully have. That's not going to happen.
So here we are dealing with a huge, complex, almost 250-page bill that amends one of the most complex pieces of legislation we have, which deals with our democracy and our election process, and so far, all we've seen from the government is they rammed it through the House with little or no debate. As soon as they could, they brought in closure. Prior to that, I might remind everyone, there was no proper consultation with anyone outside the Conservative world. They used the argument that it was okay to ram it through the House because once the bill got to committee, that's where the real work would happen, that it's just a kind of show in the House, and once it got to committee, that's where we would roll up our sleeves and start getting some serious work done.
All right, here we are at committee, and here's the opposition saying let's get some serious work done, let's agree on a fair process in terms of how to proceed and then let's get at it. The same government that rammed the bill through the House under the guise of saying that they want to get it to committee so there can be a thorough discussion now doesn't want to have that thorough discussion. They don't want to give Canadians an opportunity to be heard on their fundamental right of citizenship, which is the right to vote.
I will constantly be coming back, Chair, to the theme of wanting a deal. I'm an old auto worker negotiator. I like negotiating. I like the process of getting to yes, and compromising, with a little give and take. I enjoy the process, because my experience in almost 30 years at all three orders of government is that's really when we get good work done: when we can come to a compromise, especially on process.
Again, this shouldn't be the biggest fight, and it needn't be. It needn't be. What we should be doing is talking about this bill. However, in a parliamentary democracy, there are certain rights that non-government MPs have. Those rights are extended to the official opposition members and the other opposition members, but most importantly, in a democracy, they extend to the people. If the people want to come out in their communities and do nothing but sing the praises of the government at hearings in northern Canada—