Oh, I see. Self-control, self-control.
I think I've always believed that government members are sympathetic to the government agenda and the opposition members are, shall we say, less than sympathetic to the government agenda. Then it goes from there to, you know, you can support the government's agenda, you're opposed to the government's agenda, or you can support without any reservation whatsoever, totally and absolutely, right on the government side or on the opposite side. So it's a continuum, and we should be at the end where partisanship is at its most reduced, but I don't think we can actually talk about non-partisanship in a parliamentary committee, even though it is a public accounts committee.
We are the committee of oversight, we're not the committee of non-partisanship. We're the committee of accountability; we're retrospective, but we have to see it in that light. And the more the members see it in that light, the more active and the more productive the committee has been, in my experience.
Parliament has, in my opinion, four responsibilities. We do four things as parliamentarians: we approve legislation, or otherwise; we approve the budget to raise the revenues for the government to run the country, or otherwise; we approve the estimates for the government to spend money as allocated and approved by Parliament, or otherwise; and number four, government reports to Parliament. It's this government reporting to Parliament, Mr. Chair, that is our committee responsibility, because this is where government accountability comes in.
Legislative committees deal with legislation, they hear from civil society, they hear from other people who have some opinion on the legislation proposed, and therefore the government can find out whether it resonates with the public at large. This is what legislative committees do. But we are unique in the fact that we deal with this accountability. Government reports to Parliament, and Parliament has delegated that to us.
On the concept that we should be perhaps of a higher profile, in the United Kingdom, for example, PAC is perceived as the premier committee, Mr. Chair. In fact, I was over there one time and one of the parties was having a leadership race. There were two or three contenders; one had been the chair of the PAC and one of the others hadn't. The fact that the person hadn't been the chair of the PAC, running for the leadership of the party and hence, potentially, to be the prime minister of the country, was deemed to be a detriment.
We have some work to do, and I'm looking for leadership from you, Mr. Chair, so we can become the premier committee of the Parliament of Canada.