Thank you, Chair.
I know that Ms. Kwan would like to make a contribution. I would just like to make a couple of comments and then I will give way.
I appreciate where Mr. Badawey is coming from. I appreciate his eagerness to get on with the discussion. I think we would all like to have that discussion, but what we have before us is a motion with a guillotine. We have a guillotine motion with a deadline of June 2. To have meaningful dialogue, a meaningful discussion, to hear from witnesses, to address the three points that are laid out in that motion in the time constraints of a June 2 deadline, without any assurance that this isn't going to be rammed through unilaterally by one party at the end, I think is unfortunate. That's where we find ourselves in this discussion today.
I appreciate the eagerness of the member to move forward, but at the same time, I think we need to have this discussion on trust. I think, unfortunately, the way this has been brought forward by the minister by publicly releasing the document, the way these motions came about, is unfortunate.
To the comments on the estimates process, I don't think there's any debate that there can be improvements to the estimates process. To take away those two months of review time.... Ms. Kwan has rightly stated that parliamentary committees have only a limited capacity to do that, and taking away two months of that opportunity is challenging.
The parliamentary budget officer, again an authority in this place, has expressed serious concerns about where the government is moving on this matter. The estimates process has been an on-going, long-time issue in the House. In my first intervention, I referenced a former professor of mine, a former senator from the other place, Senator Segal, who has written and spoken extensively on the deemed rule, the rule that estimates are deemed to have been reported back to the House regardless of whether or not the committees has reported them. I think that's unfortunate.
A final point on the estimates is that a lot of this can be solved if the government simply moved up the budget time frame, moved up and tabled an earlier budget. That solution has been suggested in a number of quarters, to move up the budget, even to the fall, in fact, as done in other jurisdictions.
Those were my few comments on that. I know Ms. Kwan wants to make an intervention. I appreciate her allowing me to get in a few words, and now I give way to the member for comments.