Thank you, Madam Chair.
I'll make one point right off the top. My understanding of the subamendment that Mr. Nater has put forward is that the report would still be presented to the House. There would be a recommendation along the lines that Mr. Nater is proposing that would be embedded into the report. There would be a report presented to the House. Once it's presented, if it were concurred in, the recommendations, including the one that Mr. Nater is putting forward, would become an order of the House.
You are right in the sense that, for any member of Parliament or senator, the Governor General or the Queen, committees cannot summon those people to show up at committee or, essentially, compel them to appear. However, there is the mechanism of having the House order a member of Parliament to attend a committee, and be available to provide testimony for that committee on any number of reasons, or any number of studies that a committee is engaged in. The committee can't force that; only the House can.
You're right in the sense that if there is non-compliance of a member of Parliament to attend, then the committee can also report that fact to the House. It becomes a matter for the House to then deal with, and determine an appropriate remedy or response.
As you indicated, the ability for the House to go to that next level has perhaps not been fully tested in the past, or there may not be several examples of that, or examples that can instruct your work here today. There is no problem with an order of the House at this stage requiring the attendance of a member of Parliament to attend a particular committee.
If the member doesn't attend, that's a matter for a future step where the committee could then consider anew what it wants to do about that. Maybe the committee doesn't care about that. Maybe it's not a problem, or maybe some other issue intervenes where it no longer requires that member to attend.
However, if the committee is of the view that it is still required, as I said, it can report the fact of the non-appearance by that member. It then becomes a matter for the House to determine and figure out what it wants to do, and if it wants to take any further steps in requiring that member's appearance.