Thanks, Mr. Chair.
I'm sorry, I wasn't trying to steal the thunder, but I wanted to make sure I dealt with some issues.
I'm worried about the agenda. We've been very successful as a committee, and I'm just worried we're running out of things to do. I'd like to propose at the earliest possible time, which is right now, a list of some of the witnesses that we might hear here in Ottawa before we get on the road, if indeed that's possible. I thought I would propose a list that I was going through this morning.
I did have a chance actually to look at the information provided by the department, and quite frankly, I found it very helpful. There was a study of five or six different jurisdictions around the country. If you haven't had a chance to read it.... It really gave me a good synopsis of what's happening in the rest of the world and what our problems are here.
For some of the witnesses, I was going to propose that we start off with the departments, because I think they would be most readily available and easiest to get to. I thought, subject of course to any greater wisdom than mine, that we would have to talk to DFO, Natural Resources, Environment Canada, and indeed Infrastructure, because of course it is a separate department. Those are the ones that I saw as most seriously connected to navigable waterways as far as what's taking place with them.
And then I also thought, at the same time, while we're listening to those witnesses, we could send out an invitation to all the provinces. I know that Alberta would like to have some input. I believe that Quebec would as well, because of some issues that are going on there, and I know Ontario would. As well, I thought that the FCM would be a good witness to bring forward, because it deals with the bigger municipalities, as well as the smaller provincial municipality organizations such as SARM, AMM, and AMO in Ontario.
Those were some of the ideas that I had, but certainly I'd like to banter it around as much as anybody wants. I thought what we could do is listen to more or less the organizations, the governments, and the departments here at this level, and then when we go around the country, if that is indeed possible, we can get input from stakeholders on the ground that aren't really department- or government-organized.