Yes, Madam Chair, I'll get back to MP Turnbull's amendment.
The point I'm making, and I'll just close this up on this point, is that what was said to me moved me: “What's happening? What's going to happen? When are you coming home?” Obviously that Friday night I came home and the rest is history with respect to what happened after we got home, and the numbers and so on and so forth.
My point is that with MP Vecchio's motion to study the reasons for prorogation, how can you reasonably wonder why we prorogued, when we literally had to, using an old football analogy with the Buffalo Bills, “circle the wagons”, as they used to say, and regroup, and make sure that we came out with a new throne speech with the proper policies and plans to support Canadians.
Again, I go back to MP Turnbull's amendment to MP Vecchio's motion. I read it, and I had a few other people read this too. Look, if you're really not vested as a Liberal or Conservative or Bloc or NDP or Green or an independent, and you read the motion, anybody objectively reading this motion would say, “Oh boy, there's something going on here. There's some smoke here, and where there's smoke, there's fire. We've got something here, and we're going to get to the bottom of why they prorogued...production of records, communications with WE and memoranda and emails.” I believe that people who are objective, in not doing it for partisan political reasons....
Again, let me jump in quickly here. I know this happens on both sides of that fence. I don't know; I should take that back.
When we were in opposition, Her Majesty's loyal opposition was there to keep the government's feet to the fire, to challenge and to make sure.... We all know why we prorogued. Canadians, to put it bluntly, I don't want to say they don't really care, but they're not concerned about prorogation. They're not. We prorogued because we needed to reset. It's not like we were trying to run away from it and sweep it under the rug per se.
MP Turnbull has come back with an amendment saying that, okay, these are fair points, and you want this and this. Okay. So we're going to propose this. I respect very much that we, obviously, have taken out the Prime Minister, but we still have in that amendment the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Diversity, Inclusion and Youth. We're still saying, look, these are senior people. These are senior people in our government who chaired the COVID committee. I don't think anybody here, or really anybody in Canada, would argue that Minister Freeland is a prominent and involved minister in our government. Again, I don't want to be too far over my skis here, but I would have a hard time thinking that she wouldn't have the answers to the questions that the opposition parties want to ask.
But then I will go back to this, and I believe this. At times it feels as though it's not just about getting answers. It's getting answers from the Prime Minister when he has already given the reasons that he, we, the government or what have you prorogued.
I think MP Turnbull's amendment to the motion is well thought out. I will be honest with you that when I first read it, I thought “What?”. I didn't actually call or message MP Turnbull. I thought, “Are you sure you meant to keep the Deputy Prime Minister in there? Are you sure?” But, yes, he did. Geez, look, I thought it was a mistake when I first saw it to be perfectly honest. I thought it was a mistake. I thought, “Oh, no, they don't mean to have Minister Freeland in there. Oh, yes. Yes, there she is.”
I know all of us know that there won't be a different answer. There won't be a different sentence than what has already been said.
Then we go back to, okay, why is inviting the Prime Minister such a stumbling block?
I go back to how it's because of the optics and the perception of calling the Prime Minister when he's already said the reasons why.... I know that Canadians are seized with getting through this pandemic. We have such great news with respect to vaccines and the number of vaccines that are coming into this country. I very happily got my AstraZeneca vaccine three weeks back. My wife Denise did too. I suffer from some very mild asthma and things like that, but I faithfully get my flu shot every year.
As for the euphoria, the excitement, the gratitude and the thankfulness I had at getting my AstraZeneca vaccine, I can't describe it. I'm not going to say that I was emotional to the point where I went outside and cried, but I will say that I was like, “You know, thank God the vaccine was available, thank God that science is winning over and we have the capability to produce something that can literally save millions of lives, and also thank God that we have a government.”
Look, of course I'm a Liberal member of Parliament, and I'm proud of my party, our policies and our leader and so on, but it made me thankful just for Canada and the fact that we have those systems in place and we have a government, a strong government that can look after us in times of crisis and need. We hadn't been through this. I'm very thankful. Obviously, all of us are politicians and in the political world, but my view of government, political people and politicians has changed. I have a newfound...and this may sound crazy....
We have MP Kent there with his binoculars. I don't know if there's a good view out there or what's going on.