Thanks, Mr. Chair. I am very new to this committee, so thank you for including me today.
I've had a chance to read the minutes of the proceedings dated June 19, 2007, meeting number 60, of this committee. I've had a chance to take a closer look at Marleau and Montpetit in House of Commons Procedure and Practice. In it there's an interesting and operative passage that I'd like to read. It says:
Where a committee has not made a formal decision concerning the convening of its members, either by adopting a work plan or by concurring in a steering committee report, the Chair usually consults with members informally concerning possible future meetings.
Now, notwithstanding anything I've heard from the parliamentary secretary, which I think he's trying to frame as, effectively, using my language, a nobility of purpose, why would we convene this meeting in the summer, against the will of this committee, against the will of Parliament? Why would this happen?
There's an old Latin maxim from law that loosely translated goes something like this: A man always acts for a reason. I think Canadians would be forgiven if they were to discern and detect here a pattern of conduct from this government over the last eighteen months that is troubling. Let me review.
At the international trade committee witnesses were directly and explicitly censored by the chair. At the environment committee the chair--