Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on June 18th, 2025

[The Clerk of the Committee, Malachie Azémar]

Honourable members of the committee, I see a quorum.

Pursuant to Standing Order 106(3)(a), as clerk of the committee, I will preside over the election of the chair.

I must inform members that the clerk of the committee can only receive motions for the election of this person. The clerk cannot receive other types of motions, cannot entertain points of order nor participate in debate.

We can now proceed to the election of the chair.

Pursuant to Standing Order 106(2), the chair must be a member of the government party.

I'm ready to receive motions for the chair.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I nominate Terry Sheehan, member of Parliament for the home of the Greyhounds, Sault Ste. Marie, as chair.

[The Clerk]

It has been moved by Mr. Lemire that Mr. Sheehan be elected as chair of the committee.

Are there any further motions?

Is it the pleasure of the committee to adopt the motion?

(Motion agreed to)

I declare the motion carried and Mr. Sheehan duly elected the chair of the committee.

[Some hon. members]

Hear, hear!

[The Clerk]

I invite Mr. Sheehan to take the chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Thank you very much to my nominator.

Welcome, everyone, to the 45th Parliament's first INAN committee meeting to elect chairs and vice-chairs.

Thank you, Clerk, for going over the rules of this meeting.

Go ahead, Jaime.

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso—Antigonish, NS]

Mr. Chair, I'd like to congratulate you on your role, and I'd like to nominate Jamie Schmale for a vice-chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Do you accept, Jamie?

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes, ON]

I do.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Are we all in favour?

(Motion agreed to)

[The Clerk]

I declare Mr. Schmale the first vice-chair.

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso—Antigonish, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd also like to nominate Sébastien Lemire for the second vice-chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Sébastien, do you accept?

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Yes.

Meegwetch.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

All right. All in favour...?

(Motion agreed to)

That's perfect.

Mr. Clerk, we have another order of business. It's to adopt the routine proceedings and such. There are quite a few of them.

I know that other committees have adopted them on unanimous consent. Is that something I heard some people talking about?

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes, ON]

I so move.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Jamie so moves, and I'm seeing nodding heads, so we do have unanimous consent to adopt those.

(Motions agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Okay, I think that is all we had with regard to business. I don't think there is new business.

Oh, I'm sorry, Jamie. Go ahead.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and congratulations on your appointment.

Thank you to everyone here. I look forward to working with you in the coming weeks and months.

There are a couple of things that we'd like to put on the agenda for discussion either today or later.

There were a couple of studies in the last Parliament that did not get completed. One was the taxation study. We had drafting instructions, but I don't think we got to the actual report.

There was also, of course, the procurement study that we had just finished towards the end. We'd like to, if it's the will of the committee, bring those forward or have those brought forward as we come back in September—or whenever we're back next—and go through them and finalize those two reports, if possible, if the committee agrees.

Then I'd like to, at some point before we adjourn, do a motion—or however the chair believes is best to do this—to create a study schedule so that we are all prepared when we come back in September.

How we did it in the past, Mr. Chair, was that each party had its own study to do, and we kind of went in a rotation. The topic didn't matter. It was up to the individual parties to choose that. Then we just rotated through.

I think that maybe we should deal with the first part first and then maybe get to the second part, if that works for you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Sure.

Because we're introducing some new ideas, we need a UC motion, especially to table.... That's not really the substance of the report. They've already been worked on or almost completed. Is that correct?

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes, ON]

Yes.

Do we have to bring a motion for the clerks, or did that get in the programming motion? They would have the answer.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

The analyst would like to make a comment.

Please take a seat at the table.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes, ON]

I'm sorry. I should have prepped you that I was going to bring this up.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

They're at the end, as I suspected and as you mentioned. That is something we could entertain when we reconvene in the fall. It's very close, according to the analyst.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes, ON]

Is it both studies, or just the procurement one?

[Brittany Collier, Committee Researcher]

Would you mind clarifying? The other study was...?