Evidence of meeting #76 for Public Safety and National Security in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was chair.
A video is available from Parliament.
6:45 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
I have been refreshing my email and I have not received it yet.
6:50 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
It's going to be sent imminently. Is that what you're saying, Chair?
6:50 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Okay. It is important for the committee to know precisely what it is debating and to have the text of what it is debating in front of it, although I don't get the impression that the clarification substantively changed the direction. It just provides clarification about names and titles.
Before Mr. Julian's intervention, I was walking through why I think the changes we're proposing are necessary logistically, given the inevitable practical problems that arise from the framework for studying this issue that was presented by Mr. Julian.
We have nine entities that could or are likely to appear. We have, although not directly stated—but I hope implied—the possibility that committee members might be able to suggest additional witnesses or members of the public who have some perspective to offer and who might wish to come forward on this issue, but at a minimum, we're talking about nine. If our amendment on Mr. Mendicino doesn't pass, we're talking about a minimum of eight. If it's eight, we have three, three and two, so I just want—
6:50 p.m.
Liberal
6:50 p.m.
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
In the rules.... It's clear this is a filibuster, but according to the rules, there still cannot be repetitiveness. We've actually already heard—I believe three times, but at least once before—Mr. Genuis describing the difference between nine witnesses and eight witnesses. It would be important if he's going to filibuster that he at least provide new content.
6:50 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Can I just comment on the point of order, Chair?
6:50 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Thank you, Chair.
I accept that I said the number. I was just correcting myself because I said nine, and I wanted to be accurate. I think that was a relatively perfunctory and brief comment, but I wanted to provide that clarification. It's a small point.
The point I was just making, Chair, is that if you're trying to slot that in, one way of doing this is to have three consecutive one-hour blocks. Inevitably, there will be five to 10 minutes of turnover in between, when witnesses come and go, hands are shaken and so forth. You're talking, in practice, about 55 minutes per witness group, of which, almost certainly, about 20 minutes will be testimony. That leaves 35 minutes for questioning rounds. That likely means one round of questioning, with two or three minutes extra for each party at the end.
We're supposed to be studying the issue in a serious way. Committee members will be faced with a situation where they have likely three, in most cases, witnesses or witness groups with substantive and different things to say, and members of each party are then expected to cram all the things they might wish to say or the questions they might wish to ask into one round of questioning, with a bit of change at the end, a bit of extra time.
That seems to be fundamentally and obviously unserious. I don't mean “unserious” to be pejorative or insulting. It may be that the motion was brought with the best of intentions, but if you really break it down and ask how much time we are going to have to be able to ask the questions and get the answers, we're going to have one slot with two minutes extra, at best, to try to go through three very distinct witness groups. Then we're going to try to have a fast turnover and do it all again in the same crammed bit of time, and then we'll have another turnover and do it all again in a crammed space of time, and it will be done. This obviously doesn't make sense from a structural standpoint.
Now, the alternative approach you could take.... Theoretically, there are numerous alternatives. I guess you could have all nine groups sit there for three hours, but I suspect that wouldn't happen. Another way, and I've been on committees that.... I was previously the vice-chair of the special committee on Canada-China relations, which regularly met for three hours, so we had to consider these questions of how to structure its time in the context of a three-hour meeting. We would do it, typically, in one of two ways. One way would be three consecutive one-hour blocks, which required a very fast turnover and had a limited number of questioning opportunities, as I've illustrated. The other way was to do two groupings for an hour and a half each. You have an hour and a half, and potentially more witnesses. If we were to do it that way, we would have to have four or five witness groups for an hour and a half.
Again, having four or five witness groups at the same time would mean that you have more rounds of questioning in each case, though I think not many more. In that case, you'd likely have all of the witness testimony and then you would have, perhaps, an hour of questions, which would be substantively two rounds. However, if you wanted to focus each round of questioning on one witness group, as is often done, you could ask questions of only two out of the four or five witness groups. I don't think that....
I think a good rule of thumb for committees managing their time vis-à-vis witnesses is that each party would have roughly one round per witness group, so if you wanted to spend a round questioning a witness, you would have enough rounds to be able to make sure that.... You might not want to do it that way, of course. You might want to use multiple rounds on the same witness, or jump between witnesses in the same round, but I think that is a good rule of thumb for a committee that is serious about getting to the bottom of the issue.
There would be other, more ad hoc ways of doing it. You could have one witness appear for just half an hour, and then you could have other witnesses appear for an hour and a half. However, either way, we're talking about really cramming people together and almost certainly not giving the kind of solo opportunity to be heard that some of these people really deserve to have.
I think that if we do have the courtesy of having the former minister of public safety come before the committee.... I hope he would agree. If he does agree to come and then we say, “Okay, we want you to sit for an hour and a half while we also question a whole bunch of other people who have important things to say on the subject”, I don't think that would make sense in terms of respect for his time or the choice that he has made to appear before the committee. I think that is fairly obvious.
Mr. Chair, behind this, then, having deconstructed the inevitable challenges associated with hearing from each of the witnesses in the sequence described, I'm left with the question “Why?” Why was the motion proposed with a structure that is obviously not workable? Maybe Mr. Julian, in concert with those he was negotiating with around this, was working quickly and didn't do that kind of structured analysis of how each of the hearings would occur, or maybe somebody did. Maybe somebody on the government side looked at this and said, “Well, this is an embarrassing issue for us. The Conservatives are insisting that it be talked about, so we want to do issues management, if you like, and talk about it as little as possible.”
6:55 p.m.
Liberal
Peter Schiefke Liberal Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Genuis is doing a fantastic job. I actually find it invigorating.
This room is booked for another committee meeting at 7:30 p.m. I am wondering if we could ask the clerk to officially look into what the transfer time would be and whether or not there's a specific time we would need to adjourn to ensure that the next meeting is able to start on time. We do have witnesses booked for that meeting, as well.
6:55 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
It looks like the other committee is in the other room, so it's not going to be a problem.
6:55 p.m.
Liberal
Peter Schiefke Liberal Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
That's fantastic. I'm sure Dr. Lewis is very pleased, as well, as we will be sitting on that committee together, and I look forward to that.
6:55 p.m.
Liberal
Peter Schiefke Liberal Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
You got subbed out. Now I'm very sad—I want that on record, Mr. Chair.
I'll turn the floor back over to Mr. Genuis.
7 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Thank you, Mr. Schiefke. That's an important clarification.
I don't know exactly what the plan is, on the other side, around time. I do want to make sure, before I continue with my remarks.... I do have a number of verbal notices of motion that I want to provide on other matters, so I will just read those verbal notices of motion now, and then I'll proceed with my remarks.
7 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
I would encourage you to file those. We are debating the motion before us, the amendment and the subamendment. It would be better if we could stick to that.
7 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Mr. Chair, I'll be brief, but it is a long-standing convention that members can provide verbal notices of motion. I hope that you'll indulge me to do that just briefly.
The first of those motions—and maybe some information could be provided in writing—is that, in the opinion of the committee, the government should immediately list the IRGC as a terrorist entity under the Criminal Code, and that this be reported to the House.
The second is that the committee report to the House that it should give second reading to Bill C-350, the combatting torture and terrorism act, and that it be referred to the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security.
The third notice of motion is that the committee recognize the rise in hateful attacks against people of faith and the places where they worship in Canada, affirm the constitutionally protected right to freedom of religion, and call upon the government to immediately increase protection for synagogues—
7 p.m.
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
Mr. Chair, I have a point of order.
Can I get clarification? Can a non-committee member provide a notice of motion for a topic that is not actually being debated at the time?
7 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Well, strictly speaking, these notices of motion are not part of the debate we're undertaking. They're not on the issue. Mr. Genuis is, however, properly subbed into this meeting, so, in my opinion, he's free to make those notices of motion. It's really an inappropriate time to do so, but I'm becoming brain-weary and half-dead, so I'm going to let it go.
7 p.m.
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
I'm sorry, Mr. Chair, but, on that, can any member at any time provide a notice of motion, even for a committee that they do not sit on?
7 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
When they're properly subbed into that committee, I believe it is true.
