Thank you, Chair.
Just to answer Mr. Desjarlais' questions, I have the work plan right in front of me. The witnesses invited for the next meeting on April 9 are Amazon Web Services, Inc., Microsoft Inc. and BDO Canada LLP.
Chair, I understand and appreciate what you're saying. There is a lot of confusion. I'm trying to resolve this as quickly as possible. One option would be to amend the motion to delete the reference to when those witnesses would be invited. Then, the second is that perhaps we can leave this motion be, and perhaps pick it up again at the subcommittee meeting, where members can actually just go in and have that discussion and answer any of the questions they need to have answered in order to move forward.
There's not really that much of a time difference between today and the subcommittee meeting. I think it's better that we proceed and that we understand fully what it is that we're doing, rather than passing motions when we're not really sure how they would impact the rest of our work plan.
Also, as you've said, Chair, there has been a lot of work that has already been done by you and then by the clerk in inviting witnesses, so it doesn't really make sense, I think, for us to rush through this. I think that in principle we all agree that these witnesses perhaps should be invited. I do think that this is a question of timing, and that should be better addressed through the subcommittee as opposed to putting it in a motion. I think we're all on the same page here in terms of where we want to go with the study, and it is part of our study. It's not a one-off. That's why I think this issue is better addressed within the subcommittee and the list of witnesses as opposed to a stand-alone motion.
I don't know if I'm interpreting this properly, but that's kind of where my headspace is at. Again, I would like to hear from colleagues as to what they're thinking.