There are two things. If you want to move an amendment to remove the date, I'm okay with that. I believe the minister needs to be here, since this is a policy discussion more than a discussion on the operational side. CDS can be here to talk about the operation, how it's changed, and where the training in advise and assist has gone in the last number of months.
As to the workload the committee is facing, I encourage you, Mr. Chair, to have a steering committee meeting so that we can look at how things are drawn up. I know that in January we received a list of all the different panels that are potentially available to us to look at in the NATO study. If you look at that, there are over 30 different panels to do. It will take us forever to get through them if they're all available. I don't know if we need to do each and every one of those panels.
At the same time, we want to make sure that.... Having one main witness here today for a two-hour meeting was maybe not necessary. We should have had two or three main witnesses for a two-hour meeting, or just two one-hour meetings. Those are the things we need to discuss as a steering committee to better orchestrate the workload and deal with some of the.... The peacekeeping motion has to get dealt with here sooner rather than later, because time has moved on.
I'm okay with you taking out the 30 days, but this is a policy discussion more than an operational discussion. It's the future of the mission, and it is the minister's responsibility to provide those briefings.
Also, we haven't had a briefing on this, either as critics or as a committee, for almost a year. Leaving it until June or the summertime.... You in the Liberal Party may be privy to what's happening, but we and Canadians and the opposition don't know what those operational plans are.