Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for the opportunity to speak on this subject.
I'd like to begin by saying that the government welcomes the opportunity to study the spring 2012 report of the Auditor General, beginning with chapter 2, “Replacing Canada's Fighter Jets”. We also welcome the opportunity to interview witnesses on this subject, witnesses to be decided by this committee. I assume those witnesses will include the Auditor General and also the Parliamentary Budget Officer, deputy ministers, and whoever they decide to bring. We look forward to moving ahead on this as quickly as possible.
We recognize that there are two motions before the committee and that those two motions are similar, except that one of those motions, by the opposition, wants to tell the rest of the committee who those witnesses should be. This is unorthodox. It is not the practice of this committee. It is the committee that decides who those witnesses are.
So we look forward to moving ahead. We do agree that this should be the first chapter that we study, that we study it in depth, and that the committee comes up with the witnesses to be called in.
In that regard, I call upon Mr. Byrne, who has put forward the other motion, to consider retracting that motion and agreeing to the motion that I put forward, which is essentially the same as Mr. Byrne's, recognizing that there are 12 members of this committee and that all 12 members should have a say in who the witnesses are. It is not one member who dictates to the other 11 who those witnesses should be. Based on that, Mr. Chair, I ask my colleague Mr. Byrne to consider withdrawing his motion and accepting my motion, which is very similar to his except it allows everybody to have input into who the witnesses are.
Thank you.