Thank you very much.
I think we see some foreshadowing of perhaps how a future vote in camera might go, as to whether this meeting will go back in public or not. We feel that in a democracy you want to shed light as much as possible. It's incredibly important with many of the decisions committees make—particularly pertaining to motions like Monsieur Bélanger's, about when this committee is going to report back to Parliament—that those debates should take place in public, and that members of the committee and of all sides of the House should then be accountable for the actions they take.
We've seen a disturbing trend and pattern with this government, where time and time again members seek to throw a cloak over top of committee business. That's what we are doing here, frankly, to ensure that they save themselves some embarrassment for taking decisions that would be unpopular and that Canadians would view in a negative light. I mean things like ramming through a special committee on cooperatives that doesn't have to report back to Parliament until the end of November and that would have the opportunity to go to the international summit in Quebec City in October and to participate in that and to gain all manner of best practices, as has been mentioned.
Cooperatives are about sharing those best practices, about mentoring new cooperatives, and we should be looking across the world to get better co-ops and understandings so we can foster the cooperative industries and agriculture co-ops and all sectors of co-ops in Canada. I think it's absolutely disgraceful that we're not going to be in Quebec City as a committee. Certainly on this side of the House we'll be attending as MPs and as stakeholders and interested parties.
I'll have to leave it at that.