Bill C-24 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Salaries Act and to make a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act

This enactment amends the Salaries Act to authorize payment, out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund, of the salaries for eight new ministerial positions. It authorizes the Governor in Council to designate departments to support the ministers who occupy those positions and authorizes those ministers to delegate their powers, duties or functions to officers or employees of the designated departments. It also makes a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act.

Speaker's Ruling

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, in his remarks, the member for St. Catharines said that one of the effects of Bill C-24 would be to do away with administrative distinctions between ministers. Of course, Bill C-24 would actually establish a new kind of minister. Instead of having ministers simpliciter, we would also have ministers for whom a department is designated. If the difference between a minister and a minister for whom a department is designated is not administrative, what is the difference?

[Chris Bittle, Liberal, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak in support of Bill C-24, a bill that would formalize in statute the one-tier ministry that was sworn in on November 4, 2015, and ensure that this government and future governments have the flexibility to deliver on their commitments to Canadians.

To recap what has been explained previously about Bill C-24, the Salaries Act authorizes the payment out of the consolidated revenue fund of a ministerial salary to individuals who have been appointed to a ministerial position in the act. Currently, there are 35 ministerial positions listed in the Salaries Act, including the position of prime minister. The list of Salaries Act ministers changes from time to time to align with the priorities of the government of the day and the prime ministers' preference with respect to the composition of their ministry. This is not new. Legislation amending the list of Salaries Act ministers was enacted in 2005, 2012, and 2013.

Canada needs a modern, agile, and flexible government that is organized in a way that is suited to delivering on its priorities and commitments. These amendments would help us do that. The bill would do away with certain administrative distinctions by adding to the Salaries Act five key ministerial posts, which are currently in the ministry, but as minister of state appointments.

Conventionally, ministers of state have been considered junior ministers because they have most often been appointed to assist other ministers with their portfolio responsibilities. However, this is not the case in the current ministry, where ministers of state have been given, by mandate letter and legal instruments, their own responsibilities and authorities specific to subject matter areas that are important to the government and Canadians.

The five new ministerial positions to be added to the act are minister of la francophonie, minister of small business and tourism, minister of science, minister of status of women, and minister of sport and persons with disabilities. Our government believes these are important positions for Canadians and for our economy and therefore merit full ministerial status. Formalizing these five appointments as ministers in full standing reflects the importance of the subject matter and the expectations placed on those individuals who occupy those ministerial positions. Once these positions are added to the Salaries Act, with the enactment of Bill C-24, the orders in council that assign these ministers to assist other ministers will be repealed.

I would now like to take a moment to address the question of whether there would be incremental costs associated with adding the eight new positions to the Salaries Act. To be clear, there are no incremental costs associated with the current ministry. The ministers currently appointed as ministers of state receive the same salaries as their cabinet colleagues and have office budgets commensurate with their responsibilities. This would not change under this legislation.

The legislation does, however, increase the number of ministerial positions that could be paid under the Salaries Act by two, from 35 to 37, including the position of prime minister. It is important to note that the current ministry comprises the Prime Minister and 30 ministers. This is a stark contrast to the ministry under Stephen Harper, which at one point comprised 40 members, the largest in Canadian history. The bill is not fundamentally aimed at growing the ministry. Its goal is simply to formalize in legislation the composition of the current ministry and to modernize the act to enable more flexible and adaptive ministries in the future.

It has been asked why it is important that the minister of science and the minister of la francophonie do not have the legal title of minister of state for science or minister of state for la francophonie. Why not just continue with the current framework under the current act? To be clear, these ministers are not junior ministers. Our government wants to send a strong signal to Canadians that it has a one-tier cabinet, and that these new positions and their mandates are essential to delivering the commitments we made to Canadians. We want to remove distracting administrative distinctions.

However, Bill C-24 amendments are not just about addressing government priorities in the immediate term, but about ensuring that future ministries can be structured in a way that meets emerging priorities. That is why Bill C-24 also updates the Salaries Act to enable a modern, adaptive ministry. These are achieved by adding three untitled ministerial positions to provide the government with the capacity to deliver on future priorities.

These three positions can be filled and titled at the prime minister's discretion. They offer a degree of flexibility to the prime minister to design cabinet in response to emerging challenges and priorities without having to resort to minister of state appointments.

Furthermore, the alignment of all regional development agencies under one portfolio, especially under the minister responsible for national economic development, is another example. We would now have regional national expertise working together under one roof. By adopting this change, we allow for better synergy and provide the flexibility needed to make real impact in communities across Canada.

The regional development agencies continue their hard and valued work in each region. For example, they support small and medium-sized enterprises and help them become more innovative, productive, and export-oriented. The synergy among them will help grow the economy and allow RDAs to deliver the results that Canadians in all regions of the country expect.

I would like to emphasize that removing regional development positions from the Salaries Act does not affect the regional development agencies or eliminate the need for ministerial oversight of them. On the contrary, ministers will continue to be appointed to these positions. In this ministry, the minister of innovation, science and economic development would continue to be responsible for all regional development agencies.

Finally, the legislation also changes the legal title of the minister of infrastructure, communities and intergovernmental affairs to the minister of infrastructure and communities to reflect the fact that the Prime Minister has taken on the role of intergovernmental affairs minister.

In conclusion, these changes formalize in statute the current composition of the ministry and build a degree of flexibility in the future. These amendments address administrative constraints in the current legislation and catch it up with the structure of the ministry as it operates today.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. opposition House leader for explaining to the government the various tools at its disposal to build a cabinet. Part of the genesis of Bill C-24 was that the Prime Minister and the people around him did not understand all the different tools they had at their disposal to build a cabinet, how they work, and the fact that there are different positions. That is why when the bill was first tabled, we thought it might have something to do with gender equity. That was the context out of which the bill came, as the member rightly explained. The Prime Minister had screwed up, essentially, in terms of his commitment to gender parity at the cabinet table.

If it is not about that, then the struggle is to define the relevant sense of “equal”. In our study of the bill, we have not been able to find any relevant sense that this really makes ministers more equal in a way they are not already. I am wondering if the member's study of the bill has led her to find what that relevant sense of “equal” might be.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

moved:

Motion No. 1

That Bill C-24 be amended by deleting Clause 1.

Motion No. 2

That Bill C-24 be amended by deleting Clause 2.

Motion No. 3

That Bill C-24 be amended by deleting Clause 3.

Motion No. 4

That Bill C-24 be amended by deleting Clause 6.

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to rise today to speak to my report stage amendments on Bill C-24. There are four main amendments that would adjust this bill in a major way.

In all ways, this is a very poor bill that would have a detrimental effect not only on what we are doing here in the House of Commons, but, just as importantly, on what is happening across the country in terms of regional economic development.

I want to begin by recapping what Bill C-24 would do. Essentially, Bill C-24 would paper over the ministerial changes the Liberals made when they took office two years ago. Two years later, they are here in Parliament asking us to bless what they did.

I will remind the House what those changes are. First, the Liberals are seeking to give ministers of state full ministerial status, and full ministerial salaries to boot. Second, the bill would permanently scrap the six regional development ministerial positions. They would also add a provision to let them swear in, in the future, an additional three full-rank ministers, yet to be named. We can only imagine what they may have planned for those three additional ministers.

There are only 10 minutes, so I am going to speak briefly about one of the issues I have spoken about before, and that is the elimination of the economic regional development ministers. It is something that has not gotten a lot of media profile. For those of us who are not from Ottawa or Toronto or Toronto areas, those of us from western Canada, the Atlantic provinces, Quebec, and northern Canada, this is a huge blow to what is happening in our areas. We had ministers in previous governments, previous Conservative and Liberal governments, who were directly responsible for their regional economic development portfolios. That meant that they would be able to speak at the cabinet table directly to issues in their regions, and they would be in charge of their regional economic development agencies. The Prime Minister made a decision that he wanted to change that.

Let me quote what the Prime Minister said this summer in Charlottetown. He told an interviewer that his decision to appoint one minister, from Toronto, to run all the economic development agencies, such as ACOA, was “a way of reducing the kind of politics we've seen from regional development agencies.”

What a cynical slur, not just against, at that moment, Atlantic Canadians but against all the regional development areas and regions of this country. To somehow suggest that ministers from Quebec, western Canada, northern Canada, and Atlantic Canada could not advocate for their regions and bring issues and good projects forward without it becoming political shows that the Prime Minister has zero confidence in the rest of his ministers and seems to think that only one minister, from Toronto, would be able to get the balance right between representing the regions, making solid decisions, and not being political.

There is so much more to be said on this, but I will have to wait until I give my speech at third reading to talk a little more about the regional economic development minister issue.

I want to go to another part of Bill C-24. When the government House leader introduced it, she hailed it as a bill that would equalize the status of ministers. Members will recall the great fanfare about a gender-equal cabinet when the Liberals took office, “because it is 2015”, we were told. Lo and behold, the fine print was released, and it turned out that the junior ministers of state roles were all assigned to women.

The Liberals told us not to worry. Even though they were giving all the women those smaller roles, it would be okay, because they were going to pay them just as much as the full ministers. In fact, the PMO communications director is quoted in the Toronto Star as saying, “What needs to change, from a statute perspective is their salaries, so they get the full ministerial salaries”. Wow, thanks a lot. The ladies should not worry. They would get junior roles, but the Liberals would pay them for the full role. However, they would not actually be able to bring full ministerial memos to cabinet, they would not have deputy ministers, and they would not have full portfolios. However, they should not worry their pretty little heads, because they would be paid the full amount. Boy oh boy, what an absolute insult.

Do not take my word for it. Margot Young, a law professor from the University of British Columbia, with a specialty in gender equality, appeared before the government operations committee. I will tell members a little of what she said. For starters, she said, “[T]his particular piece of legislation really doesn't, as far as I can see, have much to do with gender equality.” To those Liberals who showed up with platitudes, the professor said, “[D]on't describe something that is clearly not about gender equality as speaking to gender equality. That's disingenuous”. She said, about the “because it's 2015” quip, “[It] loses a key leadership moment to articulate and shape opinion about what it means to actually have women in positions of equality, in positions of leadership and power.”

That is where we have seen, from the very beginning, that this Prime Minister is very good at quips and saying the right thing, but in following through on his actions on many issues, but specifically on being a feminist and treating women equally, we have a seen a lot of talk but not always a lot of action and substance. The Liberals are definitely obsessed with optics. When something is presented or framed, it is of the utmost concern.

Professor Young graded their efforts on Bill C-24 by saying, “I think to frame it as a piece of legislation that speaks substantively to the issues of gender equality and cabinet composition is wrong, and it's dangerous.” It sounds like she gave this bill an F for gender equality. That was the main point she was talking about.

As I mentioned, there are many areas where we have seen this Prime Minister fail on gender equality. As I mentioned, in this specific one, ministers were given junior portfolios but not given full responsibility. We have seen this a number of other times when the Prime Minister has had an opportunity to really stand up and take direct action that will help women.

A couple of examples come to mind, such as helping Yazidi women and girls who are tormented, persecuted, and much worse. This Prime Minister had so many opportunities to allow them refuge and safety in Canada, and he has not done it.

This is a very difficult topic, but it has to be said. Most recently, he removed female genital mutilation from our citizenship guide. A very important message to send to the world is that Canada is not a place where FGM will be tolerated or allowed, and instead of making that statement, he shied away. He got scared and worried, so he withdrew it. We saw it previously when the Liberals had an opportunity to stand up for women on reserves who did not have property rights, a basic right.

The Liberals get scared when the big bullies say not to threaten them or their power. The Liberals get scared, and the Prime Minister gets scared to stand up for women.

I believe this bill is wrong in many ways, certainly on the economic development side.

We are two years in, and I have seen some really good women cabinet ministers who maybe were given these positions because it was, as he said, 2015. I think many are growing and have grown, but we also have seen some put in positions where they were destined to fail. It has been very disappointing to see.

All of us, not just the government and the Prime Minister, need to stand up for women who truly need help, women who are systemically discriminated against and hurt. Many times, it is in other countries. Just giving lip service in Canada by saying to a woman that she can have equal pay but not equal responsibility is disingenuous and hurts the authentic feminist movement, which is really about true equality for women.

This bill is damaging, and we are disappointed to see it continue.

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

There are four motions in amendment standing on the Notice Paper for report stage of Bill C-24.

Motions Nos. 1 to 4 will be grouped for debate and voted upon according to the voting pattern available at the table. I shall now propose Motions Nos. 1 to 4 to the House.

The House proceeded to the consideration of Bill C-24, An Act to amend the Salaries Act and to make a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act, as reported (without amendment) from the committee.

Government Operations and Estimates

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Moose Jaw—Lake Centre—Lanigan, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to present, in both official languages, the 10th report of the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates in relation to Bill C-24, an act to amend the Salaries Act and to make a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you very much, colleagues. We have completed our clause-by-clause examination of Bill C-24.

Is there any further business that the committee wishes to raise for the benefit of this committee?

Seeing none—

Yes, Madam Ratansi.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Colleagues, I'll bring the meeting to order. Even though we're missing two members, I think we'll begin.

First I'd like to welcome the new members to our committee for today's meeting, Madame Lapointe and Monsieur Ellis.

Before we begin, I'd also like to introduce and welcome our two members from Privy Council, Madame Boyle and Monsieur Hill. Their primary purpose in being here will be to answer questions that committee members may have about any of the clauses in Bill C-24, which we will be examining today. They're here as a resource, and I would encourage you, should you have any questions, to ask them your questions directly. I'm sure they'll be more than prepared to answer any queries you may have.

Before we start, particularly since we have a couple of new members and since we will be dealing with a few amendments that have been provided for consideration in today's examination, I'd like to go over a bit of a pro forma discussion, or introductory remarks, that you may find helpful. For those of you who have not gone through a clause-by-clause examination before, I would ask you to please pay some attention to this information.

The committee will consider each of the clauses in the order in which they appear in the bill. Once I have called a clause, it is subject to debate and a vote. If there are amendments to clauses in question—and we do have a few of them—I will recognize the member proposing the amendment, who may explain it. The amendment will then be open for debate. When no further members intervene, the amendment will be voted on.

Amendments will be considered in the order in which they appear in the package that each member should have in front of them. If there are amendments that are consequential to each other—and there are a couple—they will be voted on together. In addition to having to be properly drafted in a legal sense, amendments must be also procedurally admissible. I have with me some bright procedural minds. They will be able to advise us, and particularly the chair, if amendments are inadmissible. I have examined them and I don't believe that they are inadmissible; we should be able to go forward. The amendments would be inadmissible if they went against the principle of the bill or beyond the scope of the bill—both of which were adopted, of course, at second reading—or if they offended the financial prerogative of the crown. Again, I don't think that is the case in this matter.

If you wish to eliminate a clause of the bill altogether, the proper course of action is to vote against the clause when the time comes, not to propose an amendment to the clause. If you vote against it, the clause will be eliminated.

If, during the process, the committee decides not to vote on a clause, that clause can be put aside by the committee if the committee so wishes, and we can revisit it later in the process.

Amendments have been given a number in the top right-hand corner of your package to indicate which party submitted them. There is no need for a seconder to move an amendment, and once an amendment is moved, unanimous consent is required to withdraw it. Once every clause has been voted on, the committee will vote on the title and the bill itself, and an order to reprint the bill may be required if amendments are adopted, so that the House will have a proper copy for use at report stage.

Finally, the committee will have to order the chair to report the bill to the House. That report contains only the text of any adopted amendments as well as an indication of any deleted clauses.

If we're clear, we will proceed, unless there are any questions from committee members.

We will start with clause 1.

(Clause 1 agreed to on division)

(On clause 2)

We have an amendment to clause 2, and I'll call upon Mr. Blaikie to speak to the amendment.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

What I'm trying to understand is this. In the structure of Global Affairs, you have the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who is the minister who “holds office during pleasure and has the management and direction of the Department in Canada and abroad.”

Then there are additional ministers for Global Affairs.

“A Minister for International Trade is to be appointed by commission...to hold office during pleasure and to assist the Minister in carrying out his or her responsibilities relating to international trade.”

“A Minister for International Development...hold[s] office during pleasure”, and the job is “to assist the Minister in carrying out his or her responsibilities relating to international development, poverty reduction and humanitarian assistance.”

A further section says, “A minister appointed under section 3 or 4”, which is to say, those two sub-ministries, “is to act with the concurrence of the Minister”, who is the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

There is clearly a hierarchy within Global Affairs. The Minister of Foreign Affairs is the minister in charge. The other two ministers act to assist that minister but need the sign-off of that minister to go ahead with things. If the goal of Bill C-24 is to eliminate a hierarchy within cabinet, should Bill C-24 also not change the structure of Global Affairs so that the Minister of International Trade and the minister of international aid are independent ministers who don't require the sign-off of the Minister of Foreign affairs for the work they do?

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Say I'm a minister of X, but I'm in a position where I have to go to the minister of Y to get a sign-off for my initiative. I do the work with the resources allocated to me within a particular department, but before I can go ahead with something, there's another minister who if he or she says no, it's trumped. Then you would have a hierarchy of ministers, and it's the goal of the government to eliminate that hierarchy of ministers. Is that a right interpretation of the government's argument with respect to Bill C-24?

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Thank you very much.

Part of the project around Bill C-24 has been to try to narrow down why it is that this legislation is necessary and why it's important for Parliament to spend time on it. We heard earlier that one of those reasons is to bring legislation into harmony with the current practice of government.

An earlier line of questioning I was pursing was why we're doing that in the case of regional economic development ministers but not in the case of the different kinds of ministers. The government is not using ministers of state, so presumably, if you wanted the legislation to go here, you would get rid of it, particularly so if there's a principled objection to having ministers of state. This seems to be the case in the debate about whether you have a one-tier ministry or a two-tier ministry.

That's not clear, but I don't expect you to answer that. It's more of a comment than a question.

The other aspect of the legislation seems to be creating equality of ministers, and I've been trying to hone in on what the relevant sense of equality is because it's not exactly clear to me, if I'm being generous. I think there is a superficial answer, which is that it's nice to be called “minister” as opposed to “minister of state”, and maybe get taken more seriously.

In any event, what we did hear from the government House leader was that, with this legislation, the five ministries that we've been concerned about largely in the debate—although there's a sixth now because the Minister of Indigenous Services is currently a minister of state—are ministers to assist. One of the things that Bill C-24 will accomplish is that there will no longer be ministers who assist other ministers. Is that true? Is that one of the goals of Bill C-24, to eliminate scenarios where other ministers are characterized as assisting full ministers?

[Bev Shipley, Conservative, Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, ON]

Does anything in Bill C-24 add new responsibilities or power to the current ministers of state who are to be listed by this legislation as full ministers with full salaries?

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Waterloo, ON]

Taking a whole-of-government approach and having people represented from across the country has, I believe, resulted in better decision-making. Regardless of the cabinet table, members of Parliament in the House are able to debate legislation. We've noticed on numerous occasions that this government has listened to amendments and debated them to ensure the legislation was going to achieve the ultimate goal of benefiting Canadians. In that view, we've also worked better with the Senate to ensure that they are able to do the important work they do, once again, for the betterment of Canadians. Diversity of opinions matters. Having yourself represented and reflected matters to Canadians. It is a new way of doing things.

Something I believe most of us have heard is that Canadians expect members of Parliament to work better together. Canadians expect a government that listens, and not only listens, but hears and is able to respond. That is the purpose of government. I really believe the approach of this Prime Minister and this government is the right one. The whole-of-government approach is something that previous governments have spoken to but never delivered on. This Prime Minister and Bill C-24 formalize what we've already put into practice. I believe it modernizes the way government needs to work, and it also provides greater flexibility to ensure that any opportunities or challenges can also be considered as time advances.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Is it not the case that we're here for Bill C-24 to make the legislation cohere with the current practices of government? Is it not the case that the government says they won't use ministers of state, both kinds, because that creates a two-tier ministry, and if so, why does Bill C-24 not remove ministers of state from the legislation?