Thanks, Chair.
I thank my colleagues for the thoughtful commentary.
The fact remains that the motion is asking the committee to break the law, and I think we should all think long and hard about that. We've seen a string of motions and lines of attack over the past number of months from Mr. Scheer and his Conservative colleagues that are blatantly political and are looking to try to embarrass the CIB or to degrade the ability of the CIB—and, in fact, the entire infrastructure department—to achieve its mandate. That's what this is.
I mean, for a party that has been trying to embarrass the government, what better way to do it than to pass a motion that would throw cold water on investment to the Infrastructure Bank and prevent more projects from happening? It's brilliant in its simplicity, but it's also terribly wrong. It's not just wrong—it's illegal.
I'm sorry that Mr. Bachrach perhaps is joining in the political theatre with the Conservative Party, or perhaps he earnestly believes that this level of transparency would somehow be helpful in getting more infrastructure built. I can't assume the motive, but I'm very sorry that the motion is even on the table.
However, it's clear from the comments, including Monsieur Barsalou-Duval's comments, that there is an appetite among the opposition parties to break the law here and move forward in some way. I'm going to try to mitigate that damage and follow along with what Ms. Jaczek said. It's very important in any document production order a committee like this undertakes that the order be consistent with the relevant legislation concerning confidentiality.
I'm going to be withdrawing my previous amendment and proposing an amendment to the original motion. I can take some direction from the clerk or the chair on the orderly way to do that. I would like to ultimately get to a place where we amend the original motion to include this very specific language: “and that the production of documents be consistent with relevant legislation concerning confidentiality”.
I would also like to make an amendment that extends the patently unreasonable 20 days—in an era where we have committees working literally around the clock—and replace that with 60 days.
I would again like to hear from multiple parties on their appetite for those two amendments.
Thank you.