Public Accounts Committee on March 26th, 2007

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

I raised it in my intervention, Mr. Chairman. I quote Dr. Franks' letter again that “the final decisions on the contents and form are mine and I accept full responsibility for any faults in it”.

Now the presentation of this report is, as I said, plagiarism of Dr. Franks' work, as far as I'm concerned, in the way it is presented. It's not being presented as our tabling of a report prepared by Dr. Franks. It's as if we had written this as a committee ourselves. Some people want to go through it line by line by line, and we either—

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I'm sorry, it's up to the committee to adopt it.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

No, Mr. Chairman, I have—

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Can we have a recorded vote, sir?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

This will be a recorded vote.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

On a point of order—

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I'm going to call on—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

A point of order—

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

—the clerk—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Are you going to recognize a point of order, or are you going to abandon the Standing Orders?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

It is not a point of order, Mr. Williams. I recognize it is not a point of order. I'm sorry.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

You haven't even heard—

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

You mean plagiarism is not a point of order?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

We're adopting the report.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

No, I said the report is plagiarizing Dr. Franks' work. Are you going to address that issue?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

No, it's up to the committee to adopt the report. It's not my—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

You seem to be determining whether we're going to proceed or whether we're going to hear the points of order. So you're making the decision for the rest of us.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

You know, Mr. Chairman, we have the law clerk right here. Why don't we ask him about plagiarism, if this is plagiarism?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

No, we're not going to get—

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Why not?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Order.

The question will be put to a recorded vote.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

I have a point of order. There are two points of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I haven't heard a legitimate point of order yet.

[Brian Fitzpatrick, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

I think some of them were.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

Could you ask the clerk whether, if there are two motions on the table, the first one negating the second one, there's an opportunity to put the second one in priority?