Mr. Speaker, it is a very interesting question and here is where I am coming from. We have a country that is huge, with different regions, some remote and some urban. We have representation in the House by males and females who represent their constituents, and this election of chair of a committee is not as straightforward as my colleague would think.
We need to have a balance, like the balance we have with the selection of members of cabinet, secretaries of state and parliamentary secretaries. From time to time the government parties will have to establish a balance. How many women chairs do we want? How many male chairs? What regions do we want to have represented on that specific committee?
I am sure my colleagues go through the same exercise when they want to select people to sit on committees. It may not be all the time, but any member of any party in the House, including mine, who chooses a committee to sit on, does not always end up on that committee. I have selected committees in the past that I wanted to sit on and I was not given that opportunity.
The most important point I want to tell my colleague is that we are over the age of 18, most of us in terms of age as well as mental capacity. I am sure the member does not mean to generate insult here insinuating that some of my colleagues are afraid to speak their minds on committees. That is far from it. We already vote on the committees by a raise of hand or by roll call. However I also want to let him know that if we do not have a secret ballot in the House why should we have a secret ballot at the committee level?
I also want to tell him that when it comes to cabinet proceedings, even though they are confidential and after 30 years are rendered public, is he suggesting that committees should use the same procedures to release the voting patterns of members? I do not know. I would say that it is gone, we have voted on it but, nonetheless, I would suggest it was the wrong thing to do.