Thank you very much. I appreciate that.
There's one thing I've been trying to sort out, not just throughout your intervention but the intervention of others. I'll speak for myself on it; I won't speak for other members of the committee here. I think it's pretty clear that the Prime Minister was acting within his constitutional right to prorogue Parliament. I don't think that's where the dispute is. There's a question as to motive, obviously. That's been investigated at other committees beyond this one. I'm concerned about some of the goings-on of the WE Charity scandal. I'm concerned about the way in which prorogation interfered with parliamentary proceedings on the matter. I think that's serious. That's why I've been supportive of the motion that the amendment we're currently discussing seeks to modify.
Beyond that, I think there are some other questions. For instance, there's the timing of the prorogation, both when it began and the length of time. We know that opposition parties.... Again, I'll speak for the NDP. The NDP was calling for Parliament to return earlier in September, something that was made impossible by the prorogation. We were concerned about the pending expiration of the CERB. We wanted to make sure that we got the legislation right and that there was an opportunity for parliamentary discourse on that. A shorter prorogation closer to the Speech from the Throne would have created some space for Parliament to meet, including the final summer meeting of Parliament that was scheduled and would have taken place shortly after the day the Prime Minister decided to prorogue. There are questions about the timing and the effect that had on the discussion about what happened at the end of CERB as we knew it then.
What we've constantly heard in all of this is that, at the end of the day, it's the Prime Minister who makes that decision. He's the one with the right to make that decision, and that's just the way it is. That's why I think it would really make sense in the context of this study—a historic study in the sense that there hasn't been a like study of prorogation before. There hasn't been a like study of prorogation before because we've never required the government to give any reasons under the Standing Orders. That was something the Prime Minister himself committed to, in 2015, as his proposal for how to correct the abuses of prorogation that occurred under the Harper government.
We have a dual reason, as far as I'm concerned, for hearing from the Prime Minister beyond pressing for more answers on the WE Charity scandal, which is in itself, in my view, a very legitimate reason to have him here. It's also a question around his decision on the timing and the length of prorogation. It's about setting a good precedent for his own remedy to the abuses of prorogation under the Harper government, which was to have the government submit a response, to have it go to PROC, presumably for study. We keep hearing that all roads lead back to the Prime Minister on prorogation, so it's important for us to hear on the substance of this particular prorogation but also in general to set the precedent that the procedure and House affairs committee would, as a matter of routine, hear from prime ministers when prorogation happens.
I find it hard to believe that anybody who felt that Harper had abused prorogation, as I do, and I think, from your comments earlier, you do also, Mr. Simms....
Had the procedure and House affairs committee studied that, it would have been important to have the Prime Minister there. In fact, that Prime Minister ought to have appeared before PROC in order to try to provide some justification for what he did. We have the issue of the precedent on how this mechanism should happen, that the Prime Minister himself devised, in order to prevent political abuse of prorogation. Then we have some matters beyond the WE Charity scandal of the timing and duration of prorogation. We've heard that the person who can really answer this is the Prime Minister.
I've said to this committee before, very clearly, that if the Prime Minister would publicly commit to coming to PROC for an hour, we could dispense with this motion, because I'd be satisfied, at least, that we'd then set a good precedent. Even if I don't like the answers that the Prime Minister would provide, we'd at least get the precedent part right and we would have an opportunity to further explore these questions around the timing and length of prorogation.
It seems to me that obliquely, I feel, Liberals have said that I'm engaged in some sort of extreme partisanship on the matter. I don't think that comes off as a really extremely partisan thing. I think there's some appropriate concern for establishing a new parliamentary tradition and getting it right from the get-go. I think there are legitimate questions around the timing and length of prorogation that are fair to ask. We've heard that we've yet to ask it of the decision-maker himself. Wouldn't it be appropriate to conclude this study by hearing from the decision-maker and then getting on with filing the report and moving on to other business?
Thanks for the opportunity to intervene. I really do appreciate it.