Madam Chair, on that, we considered a larger study on judicial appointments that called on a number of witnesses. This motion is for a much narrower study, calling only the Minister of Justice, who I know would like to speak about this. It is our role as a committee to look into this issue of vacancies, particularly around federally appointed judges.
I do, at this point, have to challenge the chair's ruling, because what it does is limit our ability as a committee. It binds our hands to study things as new discoveries are made. We could hear something tomorrow that might cause every one of us around here to say, “We want to study this”, but your ruling would suggest we can't study judicial vacancies for a year.
I profoundly disagree with that interpretation of the rules and I challenge the chair.