Evidence of meeting #63 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was shall.
A recording is available from Parliament.
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
I call the committee to order. This is meeting number 63. Today we are here pursuant—
Yes, Mr. Scott.
11:05 a.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Mr. Chair, I'm just wondering if we can have unanimous consent that the vote will count despite the fact that you're not wearing a tie.
11:05 a.m.
Some hon. members
Oh, oh!
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
The chair already discussed that with the clerk this morning and suggested he'd be very happy to leave and we could get back to this later on in February.
11:05 a.m.
Some hon. members
Oh, oh!
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
We'll carry on, but thank you very much.
We're here to do clause-by-clause study on Bill C-586. We have a number of amendments to go through.
If you all remember clause-by-clause—your chair will remind you as he moves along—we start off with the preamble and the short title. They get dropped to the bottom and we'll pick them back up later.
(On clause 2)
Clause 2 has no amendments, so the chair will call the question.
Mr. Lukiwski.
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
The government will be voting no on clause 2.
Is there further debate on clause 2?
Seeing none, I'll call for the vote.
11:05 a.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
I would ask for a recorded vote.
(Clause 2 negatived: nays 5; yeas 3)
(On clause 3)
December 11th, 2014 / 11:05 a.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON
On a point of order, Mr. Chair, perhaps we could save a bit of time here.
Mr. Scott, is it your intention that all votes be recorded, in which case we could skip your having to ask the chair each time, or is it just on certain ones?
11:05 a.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
I think so; all votes that are not in favour of....
Yes, let's just say that all votes should be recorded.
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Okay. That will save us time.
You have enough paper and you're all set.
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON
Actually, sorry; I am interested in saving time. Could I suggest that if everybody is in favour of something, then we actually just skip the recording of those votes, and if there's any opposition we then start the recording?
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Let's do a recorded vote on that, then, please.
(Clause 3 negatived: nays 5; yeas 3)
(On clause 4)
Mr. Lukiwski, you need to move this, but before you do, I'll suggest that amendment G-1 is consequential to amendments G-2 and G-5, and a vote on amendment G-1 will also apply to amendments G-2 and G-5.
Mr. Lukiwski, we'll have you move the amendment.
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Would you like to speak to it? Or no, wait; you've moved it, so I'll now go to NDP subamendment 1, which applies to amendment G-1.
We'll have Mr. Scott go to that one first.
11:05 a.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
We're perfectly happy with the government amendments, except we would like to supplement them.
Within the current amendments, what would end up being subsection 67(5) in G-1, at the bottom of the page, would have to be renumbered as subsection 67(6) so that we could insert the following as a new subsection 67(5):
Within one month of the convening of a new Parliament after a general election, the chief agent of every political party shall report, in writing, to the Chief Electoral Officer the institutional position or positions of the person or persons who will be authorized by the party under subsection (6) to endorse prospective candidates.
I circulated a document giving the rationale. The rationale is simply that under the government amendments, which are welcome, it's still the case that nobody will know who is to endorse the candidates until this very late stage in an election process. The only requirement is to name a person, a human being, or more than one person. Our view is that a party should know well in advance what positions within their party structure are the ones that will be assigned this role, and therefore that can be named well in advance. Then the government's provision kicks in for naming who those persons are 25 days before polling day.
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON
I have a question.
The way the bill is now written, I'm assuming that the link between the officer who approves prospective candidates and individual ridings has been separate, that is, it's not one person per riding. Am I correct in that, Mr. Scott?
11:05 a.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Yes. It's now made completely general and optional. Each party indicates which person. Because of the government's amendment, “or persons”, it could well be that the party will decide that there's going to be a person per riding. They could decide that there's one person for the party as a whole, or they could decide that there's a panel at the national level, but the old system, Mr. Chong's system, has been entirely removed by this.
