Mr. Speaker, I want to underline that I made two separate suggestions with respect to adjournment debate. One was to move the time of the adjournment debate, but the other was to require that the minister responsible be there to respond to the question. The change would not have nearly the effect I would hope without that second part of it. Right now, we often have a parliamentary secretary who is not even responsible for the file reading out something written in response. By having the minister there, at least there would be some clear accountability with that minister and, I would argue, a greater degree of public and media attention.
I am not opposed to some of the potential changes to question period that the member has proposed, but the time limits for question period allow for more members to get up. If we extended the time for each question, we would either have to extend question period overall, which would cut into subsequent debate, or we would have to reduce the number of members who participate. What I am saying is that we can have that discussion with the simplest of changes.
Let us take what we already have, which is adjournment debate, and beef up its importance and our use of it, making it more substantive and drawing more attention to it.