That's disappointing. The NDP will vote against their own amendment.
Having heard Dr. Lewis's comments, I think it highlights that the study isn't relevant to this committee. I know the Conservatives, with respect to the supply day debate today on this subject and the discussion of the organization in multiple other committees.... I take the point from Dr. Bachrach himself, who said that it was a tenuous link between this study and the actual mandate of this committee.
I tend to come to this committee only when we're discussing infrastructure issues, and it tends to be that there is an interest in the Canada Infrastructure Bank. I think there's ideological opposition to it with respect to all of the opposition parties, for three distinctly different reasons. I know there were some challenges when it first started out, but we're seeing excellent work by the bank in securing almost $32 billion in private capital towards 56 projects that benefit ridings across the country.
I'm happy to have Mr. Cory come and testify. Everyone thinks they'll have a gotcha question. He actually shows and is very good at outlining the work that the committee does, project after project, for infrastructure projects that won't get built.
In my role as Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Housing, Infrastructure and Communities, I meet not only with members of Parliament, members of the opposition. I meet with mayors, representatives and indigenous leaders across the country. The number-one item—including from the members who are looking at me, hoping that I'll stop talking, and including the witnesses who testified today—is that we need more infrastructure. We need better infrastructure with respect to airports, but also with respect to all items across the board. What better way to do that than to help leverage private capital?
The Conservatives were onside when it was the Harper government. “Public-private partnerships” are fine. We call it a different thing. Maybe if it's just the name, we can change the name of the Canada Infrastructure Bank and the Conservatives will be onside. We'll go back to calling it whatever Stephen Harper called it, and they will be onside.
We even had Lisa Raitt publicly compliment one of the projects from the Canada Infrastructure Bank that the Conservatives are most furious about. The former...I believe she was deputy leader of the Conservative Party, understands, in her role now with CIBC, the importance of that work.
We can keep coming back to this time after time, but let's look at what INDU has done. The study was a recent investigation and report on sustainable development technology in Canada. They had an hour with Andrée-Lise Méthot. She appeared on November 28. There was one and a half hours on December 5. There was a meeting on December 11. There was another meeting on December 12 and another meeting on December 14, which brought us to the Christmas break. Then there was a one-hour meeting on January 31 and another meeting on June 5.
With respect to the ethics committee, they also did a study on “Allegations Related to Governance and Management of Contributions by Sustainable Development Technology Canada”. Maybe we in Parliament should become better at creating our study names—it's a little dry, but it's a very important topic. At ethics, there were two meetings, and at public accounts, on June 6, they spent two hours on “Report 6: Sustainable Development Technology Canada”.
I think Monsieur Barsalou-Duval called it a witch hunt. Maybe it's more of a fishing expedition and we should report this to the fisheries committee for their study.
That's what we have. I appreciate the vigour of the opposition in trying to keep pulling at the threads, but we've been there before.
I'm hoping that we can come back to the original amendment, but I'm hoping maybe.... Perhaps just throw it at the wall and see if it works, Mr. Chair, and perhaps we could suspend again for a few minutes. If not, I'm happy to keep going, but perhaps we could suspend for a few minutes and see what we can do.