Thank you, Madam Chair.
Before arriving at today's meeting, I was told that the whips had discussed things and agreed that there would be a three-hour meeting next Wednesday. That's the first thing.
Also, I went through the exercise of figuring out what time slots we had left between now and June 23 to fulfil our mandate, which is considerable. I'm trying to look realistically at the work plan that we can put in place based on the timetable. Next week we will have a three-hour meeting. Actually, I'm not going to look at the number of hours, but rather focus on the number of weeks we have ahead of us. If I count the next two weeks of parliamentary recess, I see that we have seven weeks before we have to start drafting the report. Indeed, it is not too much to think that we will have to spend two weeks drafting the report and then another two weeks studying the report. That already brings us to June 23.
In essence, if we count the next two weeks of parliamentary recess, we have seven weeks left to complete our mandate, which, according to the motion, is to examine the issue of mature minors, the issue of advance directives, the issue of mental illness, the status of palliative care in Canada, and the issue of protecting Canadians with disabilities.
We have agreed to table the report on June 23. However, I would like to bring to your attention the fact that in Quebec, it took 74 appearances, 39 working sessions and 46 steering committee meetings to review the Act Respecting End-of-Life Care. We did a serious job, which we can, of course, draw on. However, if we really want to deal with these issues before June 23 and prepare a solid report, it seems to me that we must meet quickly. I thought that today, after adopting the housekeeping motions, under motion 3 we could convene the subcommittee to establish the work plan. I don't want to lecture anyone, but it would be the responsible approach.
I repeat that we are sitting next Wednesday. So the steering committee could meet today or Monday. We still need to call the witnesses, and we shouldn't do that at the last minute.
As far as the work plan is concerned, I humbly think that we should follow the wording of the motion. It would be interesting to deal with the issue of mature minors next Wednesday during the three-hour meeting. If we agree to do that, witnesses could be called right away for next Wednesday.
There are other suggestions I would like to make, but I will stop here, to facilitate the understanding of the proposal and the debate. I also don't want to take up all of the committee's time.
