Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague is quite correct. It is most certainly not simply a discussion paper. The government is attempting to have the procedure and house affairs committee table a report in this place recommending changes that it wants to the Standing Orders. We know that because the government has a majority in this place electorally, it also has a majority on the committee.
Despite the opposition's best efforts to reason with the government, if a report from the procedure and House affairs committee were tabled in this place, it would undoubtedly recommend the changes the government wants to ram through. That would then allow the government to fall back on the committee report and say that it did not do it unilaterally but just accepted the recommendations of an all-party standing committee. We all know that this would be a sham, because the government, unfortunately, is using the procedure and House affairs committee as political cover.
The government well knows, and I do not have to give it any lessons on procedure, because it has its own procedural experts, that if it wanted to unilaterally impose changes to the Standing Orders, it could do so without having to go through the procedure and House affairs committee. Any one of its members could simply introduce a motion introducing changes, and once the vote was held in this place and the motion was agreed to, the changes would happen automatically. The reason the government does not want to do that is that it does not want to appear to be heavy handed and mean-spirited.
It is trying to use the procedure and House affairs committee as political cover. That subterfuge will not sit well with Canadians and will not disguise the fact that the Liberals are trying to do what we know they are trying to do, which is impose changes to the Standing Orders that do not benefit all parliamentarians but only Liberal themselves.