Thank you very much, Chair.
I'm not 100% sure of this, but I believe I may be one of the only members of this committee who was in Parliament during the prorogation under the Conservative government of Stephen Harper. In response to what Mark was saying, I can assure all committee members that there was a lot of study on the reasons why the Conservative government at the time prorogued Parliament. At the time, this committee, PROC called many witnesses forward to talk about prorogation, the need for prorogation, the reasons behind prorogation. To those who suggest this is really a worthless exercise, I would point out it is not.
I would also point out that, quite frankly, in effect, even though Karen's motion went on and had several subsets to it, if you really drill down to its essence, it is really just a request for witnesses and documents to be produced to study the reasons behind the government's proroguing of Parliament. That's all it's saying.
Mark, I can appreciate that you and others may be saying that you want some time to study this. Mark, you would know, and Omar would know as well as I do, that in the last 45 minutes we have been debating this, members of the PMO and probably the House leader's staff and the whip's staff have been poring over this motion closely. They have been studying it. They have an opinion. They will be giving you advice as to which motion you could perhaps support.
I'm sorry, Mark, but you're on mute. Thanks for trying—