Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
I would like to thank my two colleagues who just spoke and all my other colleagues who signed this letter to ensure we would discuss this important issue.
And it is indeed an important issue. All of us are concerned about the influence exercised by foreign governments and their interference in our political affairs here in Canada. We are all the more concerned in this instance given this entire story that we can read in the media about the Chinese government.
I believe there's a very broad consensus on this matter, and that's precisely why we gave priority to this study among our items of business this fall. We agreed, in extraordinary fashion, in a way that I think reflects what's best in our parliamentary tradition, to conclude our parliamentary precinct study, to begin and complete a study to determine whether we want our Parliament to continue working in a hybrid manner and to commence our study on political interference. As a result, we have already begun consideration of that topic. We have already agreed to devote a number of meetings to it, and I'm entirely in favour of holding four additional meetings.
However, pardon me if I seem somewhat confused, because I don't see the urgency. We previously agreed to study the issue, and I agree the study should be extended; that's not a problem. However, I don't understand why a meeting of the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs was rescheduled so we could hold this meeting this morning, when we had planned that our committee, the Senate Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, was going to meet to discuss this matter.
The motion calls for many things, in particular the appearance of additional witnesses and the production of briefing notes, memoranda and other documents. Once again, I would point out that this isn't a problem for me philosophically. I nevertheless think that this isn't the right place to produce those documents. The National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, on which members of the official opposition now sit alongside members of all the recognized parties, can receive all those documents unredacted.
I'm a reasonable person, at least I hope so, and I think the idea behind what we're doing is entirely legitimate. However, we must ensure that the documents that are produced are communicated to parliamentarians in such a way that everyone can form a clear picture of the issue.
For that reason, I thank the official opposition members for agreeing to join the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, after previously refusing to do so for so long. I think that agreeing to sit on the committee was a good decision on their part, and I tip my hat to them, even though they may have made the decision a little late.
As a result, all the members of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians can access all the requested documents unredacted. As we all know, we have a fully functional and secure system for doing so.
There is just one part of the motion that greatly concerns me. As I said, I'm in favour of the idea behind the motion and the fact that we would be ordering the production of documents, but those documents must go to the right place. Having said that, I don't understand why these additional meetings should be held immediately and before every other activity of this committee. We're about to complete two of our studies. The draft report of one of them is already in our email inboxes, and I think it will only take one more in camera meeting to finalize the text of it.
I'm not certain I see the emergency on this, given that these are the stories referring to the 2019 election and given we've already started the study on this exact issue. This is the reason they're asking for an additional four meetings, which I think is perfectly fine. However, this would displace the other two studies, and we had come to a very parliamentary decision on them in the best traditions of Parliament. We came together to agree on them and we're just about to finalize these two committee reports. I'm not certain if I see the fire that would require us to put off those two committee reports, which could effectively be done in one week's calendar time and perhaps two or three meetings of this committee's time. Then we would go on to do what Mr. Cooper and Monsieur Berthold have suggested we should do.
Madam Chair, I'm keen on introducing an amendment to this, but I would like to hear from my colleagues.
In particular, I'd like to hear the views of my Bloc Québécois and NDP colleagues.
Madam Chair, I'd like you to add my name to the speakers list so I can speak again once all my colleagues have had a chance to do so.