Yes, sir, I appreciate that.
Thank you for the floor again.
I believe I mentioned, because it's new, the fact that our esteemed colleagues in the other place had committees that travelled 25 times over the last year, and given that the Conservatives have majority control in the Senate, I would have to assume that if they didn't move the motions, they certainly voted for them because the majority had to come from somewhere. So isn't it interesting that the unelected Senate, which by the way gets a say in some parts of the execution of our election laws, the appointed Senate—which is about as far away from democracy as you can get without giving those Senate seats to people because of who their parents are—their committees travelled 25 times. Am I going to hear from the government that the Senate was wasting the time and money of Canadians by sending out their committees 25 times?
I'm not seeing any takers to refute the point, so it would seem they thought that made good sense, that having Senate committees travel on Senate business made sense.
All we're asking for is the same thing. Why does the government believe that using their majority to send Senate committees across Canada for hearings 25 times is democratic, but when the procedure and House affairs committee should dare to ask that we go out at least to a few public communities to hear from Canadians, that's undemocratic, that that is somehow a problem?
It is pretty bad, pretty bad when the Senate.... I can't believe I'm making this statement; I know it's ugly, but the truth is like that. When it comes to listening to Canadians and travelling, the Senate, it would appear, is more democratic than the Conservatives in the House of Commons are.