Thank you, Madam Chair.
Obviously, I was not part of this committee in March, but I have looked at the facts. Thank you for presenting what you have. I have a major concern with the response that we're waiting from translation regarding the documents. The Official Languages Act states that all documents for any government organization need to be in both official languages.
Perhaps we can get a response from the government. If CBSA has documents, including CARM, that aren't in both official languages, why is that? We have borders and systems that are in Quebec and the rest of Canada. Why would we be waiting for translation? They should have been translated. That would be a bigger question of privilege to me. If we didn't have these documents already in both official languages from a government agency, I think there's a bigger issue here. There's some head-shaking, so maybe I'll get a response as to what the issue was.
Second, we've seen this multiple times. We're seeing it in different instances. If a committee asks for documents and it's been voted on, it is the privilege of the committee to get those in a timely matter. If the organization was here in March and said “a few weeks”, it is the privilege of the committee to get those in a few weeks, or we should have had ample communication that said that we couldn't get them and we weren't going to get them. Two weeks is one thing. Having amendments on this maybe in two months would be a separate thing. Six months later is unbelievable.
Even if we don't have them, or if they're not there, I think it would be prudent for this committee to pass the original motion, at least to say to the House that this committee is serious about getting those documents.
I guess the procedural question, Madam Chair, would be this: If we pass the original motion without the amendment, and if CBSA did get the documents before it came to the House, would that mean that the motion would be deemed moot in the House? Otherwise, I don't see anything wrong with this committee pushing a little harder to say that this has been a breach of privilege and that we've had far too much time now. It would almost be that a limitation would be six months, no matter what the committee. Six months is way too long to wait for documentation that was asked for, because soon enough, we'll be in 2025, and that will be a year. That's much too long, but that's where we are.
Hopefully, I'll get some other answers, Madam Chair.