Mr. Chair, I believe the majority of Canadians know a filibuster when they see one. Only in Ottawa, playing with the rules of debate in Parliament, do we talking heads think that filibusters are smart, that we played this rule against that rule. Canadians out there don't want to see that kind of nonsense. This place costs a lot of money to run. I think we need to stop this nonsense and get on with it.
In terms of what we have offered the opposition, we started out, quite frankly...as the motions and subamendments and all these amendments to subamendments to subamendments.... We've shown goodwill. We started out with three meetings. They said 25 meetings. We said eight. They said 25. If we took a break, we might even come to another number, but I suspect very strongly they'll say 25.
Canadians deserve better than a bunch of talking-head politicians gabbing away, thinking they are scoring some points with the media, thinking, “Well, maybe some smart thing I say will get on three minutes of the news”. I just hope and pray that....
The majority of Canadians won't even hear what we're saying, won't even see what we're saying. A few people will be watching CPAC and some other program that might carry a few little excerpts. People will think they got the full message, but they didn't. There's some stuff we can't talk about because it was in camera, but we heard it all; it's been all blurted out probably throughout today.
I won't take up a lot of the time of the committee. I sometimes jokingly say to my fellow constituents that some days Ottawa appears to be 20 square miles surrounded by reality. I think that today is proving that point.
Mr. Chair, I'll give up my time here, but I have to tell you that I'm getting near the end of my tether. If I start to see repetition upon repetition.... I know what the rules are, and you're bound to follow those rules, but Canadians deserve better than what's happening here.
Thank you.