Madam Speaker, the member for North Island—Powell River made the comment that the Speaker should be above partisanship, and I would hope that all of us in the House can agree that whoever is the Speaker of the House of Commons has to not only be above partisanship, but also be seen to be above partisanship. I think the unfortunate case we have seen here is a series of infractions by one Speaker, the current Speaker, that have led us down this path, and we have to deal with this issue, first and foremost.
Before we go to a broader study of the role of the Speaker and the office of Speaker, we have to first agree with the exigencies of the current situation, in which we have a seen a Speaker, on multiple occasions, undertake actions that have seemed to be partisan and outside the scope of what the impartiality of a Speaker ought to be. First and foremost, we need PROC to deal with the current Speaker before any further studies are undertaken on the more broad question of the office of the Speaker of the House of Commons.