Thank you very much for the question.
I'll be happy to discuss this with you, Mr.Lauzon.
I can confirm that there are very few seats in the House of Commons gallery. Some seats for guests are made available by the official opposition, the Bloc Québecois and the New Democratic Party. Some may even be made available by independent members and the Green Party, but I'm not sure about that.
I've always been told that for an event like Mr. Zelenskyy's address, the allocation of seats for the government was generally prorated on the basis of the number of seats held by members in the House of Commons. Once again, I presume this is still the case. The allocation of seats for government guests naturally includes diplomats and a number of other people who are required to attend because of their role or official duties, which limits the number of seats for other guests.
Our Liberal colleagues have often told me that a typical opposition MP was more likely to be able to invite someone to attend these events than a government MP because of the limited number of seats available to all the parties.