Procedure and House Affairs committee  Thank you very much for the question. The history of parliamentary reform has always been the efficient work of small committees that work in a non-partisan manner. That's how the major standing orders changes that were brought in in the early 1980s—that's the Tom Lefebvre commi

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Take care.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I totally agree with the hybrid approach, with what the Speaker of the U.K. is recommending. It might be a great way to proceed for us, and proceed slowly if possible.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes, Madam Chair, I do think we should factor in the question of confidence. A government can never continue to operate without the confidence of the House of Commons and that should never take a secondary step no matter what the situation is.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I fully agree with that assessment.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes I am, and I congratulate them for doing so. I guess my point was that I did not want to isolate a virtual technology just to electronic voting to the exclusion of the other two stages of making a decision.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I was never an expert on privilege, but I heard many grievances in my time as a table officer, and I think the Speaker would say that you have a grievance, but I'm not sure your fundamental privileges have been breached, which to me means intentional obstruction preventing you fr

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's a health and safety issue, and health and safety issues are paramount. But all parliamentary business is important. I know emergency legislation is key, but there's also the matter of a vote of confidence. You have to have confidence in a government that's facing this crisis

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think that's the kind of thing that needs to be looked at. Members themselves can give that answer perhaps better than I can. It certainly changes the dynamic of the House completely, because there is so much informal work in some ways versus the rules of procedure which dete

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes, I would agree with a staggered approach. I gather that the U.K. House of Commons at Westminster is starting slowly and seeing how it works, perhaps starting with question period and ministers' statements, those sorts of things. The values of Parliament are so much at stake.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I would agree that we should try to get a template. That's why I'm proposing that we have the experts plus members try, not in a time of crisis, to rationalize what would work and what would have minimal impact on the House. We don't want to open up a Pandora's box for other futu

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Maybe, Gordon, you could start with that.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Thank you, Gordon. The essence of my presentation was that the committee should try to get a big picture of not just the changes but the consequences of those changes. We don't really understand because it's so new. We can make the rule change but what effect does it have on the

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Thank you very much, Madam Chair, for your invitation to appear. I seem to have an unstable Internet connection, so I hope I can get through this without any problem. I would like to discuss some of the procedural issues relating to the implementation of a platform for full virt