Thank you very much to the Liberal member and the deputy House leader for being so kind with his words as well. I think that's just some of the points of clarification on this process and why this motion was put forward. This motion clearly indicated that it was regarding documentation. It's regarding discussions regarding prorogation. We're not asking for other things. We're asking about discussions that happened regarding prorogation.
I recognize that many people have gone back and they've talked about prorogations that have happened in the past. They've talked about the prorogations in 2004, 2008 and a variety of different things. Yes, that's great to put on the record, but I do want to put on the record as well that in 2017 there was a change, and this change was made because the Prime Minister said he wanted to be open, transparent and accountable to Canadians.
In the Standing Orders there was a change, so that if there was going to be prorogation, a report would have to follow that, tabled by the Crown. That has been done.
For any other report, and I can even think about what we've done in the past with the elections report, when somebody has a written report, or when a report has been tabled in their name, we have always had the opportunity to ask members about that report. We can think of the election study we just did. There was a report put in by the Chief Electoral Officer. We had questions about it. He was able to come to our committee and he was able to discuss that. That is what a report is for. It shouldn't just be a written report, slam dunk and it's done. There are many things in this, and I think if we're going to talk about open, accountable and transparent government the way that, in 2017, this was modelled, why would he not be willing to come to committee to discuss this report?
I recognize that everybody is going to say, you're doing this, this and this, but we are also setting a precedent here and I want to bring in what Daniel Blaikie said. This is the first time, because this is the first time this committee has put forward a report. We can talk about how no other Prime Minister has done this before, and that is correct. There has not been a precedent set for a Prime Minister to do this, but now there has been.
If we want to make sure that we are doing the right things for Canadians, not just for today but in the future, to make sure that our prime ministers are accountable when they're prorogating, regardless of what political party we're talking about, this is the way. We are setting the precedent for the future, not just for today. I just want to leave that with the Liberal members. I think it's really important.
I also know that there have been lots of indications that people don't want to have this reopened. I know that yesterday, and I'm just going to put this on the record, one of the members got very excited on Twitter because there were multiple polls put out. There were multiple polls put out in both French and English and the data has come in. If you need transparency, if you want to see what that data we collected was, it was showing over 60% in favour of the Prime Minister's coming to committee.
The only one that was shared unfortunately by the Liberal MPs of this committee was the English version on Twitter, but not looking at the official languages because we wanted to consider that and the different forums and templates that we're using this on. All of that information has been compiled, not that it's an official poll by any means, but the thing is this: Let's just get to the bottom of this. As I indicated, we are setting precedents. We are setting what we expect from all of our future leaders. If this current leader is not willing to do this, then he has ruined it for the rest of the country perhaps, if he's talking about being transparent.
I just want to put that forward. I look forward to any of the commentary that makes sense today and hopefully we will be able to get through this so that we can have this come to a vote.
I'm going to ask Mr. Clerk now, can we take this? I'm looking for consensus so that we can go to a vote. Are we able to go to a vote now, Mr. Clerk? I would like to call the vote on this motion.