Evidence of meeting #133 for Agriculture and Agri-Food in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was canola.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
The subamendment is only about the date, about April 5. That's all we're voting on right now. Then we'll move back to the amendment itself.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
Again, who is in favour of the subamendment? Can I have a show of hands?
Liberal
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
Right now we're just voting on the subamendment. All we need to vote on right now is the date.
Conservative
Randy Hoback Conservative Prince Albert, SK
Okay. Then I would speak to the amendment after the date.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
This is the subamendment that is being put to a vote:
[...] that all witnesses appear no later than Friday, April 5, 2019.
Who is in favour of the subamendment?
Can I have a show of hands—
Liberal
Pierre Breton Liberal Shefford, QC
I am sorry. I'd like some clarification as to which subamendment we are voting on. Is it Mr. Hoback's or Mr. Dreeshen's?
Liberal
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
The motion only refers to the deadline for the meeting. It does not change the witness list.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
Afterwards, we will vote on the amendment. Right now, we are discussing the subamendment, which only concerns the date.
Liberal
Pierre Breton Liberal Shefford, QC
So, we are voting on the subamendment to the subamendment introduced by Mr. Drouin.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
It is Mr. Dreeshen's subamendment, which is about replacing the date of April 12 by April 5.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
For the moment, we are only voting on the date. After that, we will return to the amendment and we will vote on the witnesses.
Again, can we have a show of hands?
(Subamendment agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])
Mr. Hoback, you wanted to talk about the amendment.
Conservative
Randy Hoback Conservative Prince Albert, SK
Yes. Again, I'm glad we're making some movement on the dates. It's good to see that clause is in the motion, and I want to build on that, too.
Mr. Drouin, I think you should withdraw this amendment and go back to the original motion. Without having the appropriate witnesses here, what good is having the meetings? If anything, just amend it to include producers. You need the three ministers. You need them. You know that. Everybody over there knows that. Everybody over here knows that. So leave them there.
I'd ask you to withdraw it or change it to include producers. Actually, I identify producers as industry representatives anyway, so I guess they're already included. That's fine. Just withdraw it and let's vote on the main motion.
Conservative
Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Once again, I will make the same appeal as my colleague did regarding this motion. I am going to ask my colleague to withdraw this amendment for a very simple reason: it is the role of the committee to ask the ministers to appear. Why not simply ask the ministers to appear before us? It's simple, it is easy.
Once again, the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food herself will be quite shocked to see that she is not being allowed to come to the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food to discuss this first and very serious agricultural crisis since her appointment. Let's give her an opportunity to come and speak to the standing committee on a file that concerns agriculture.
In addition, this amendment does not mention the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who is responsible... I don't know how to say it.
In short, I'm asking my colleague to withdraw this amendment, and we will keep to the original motion so that we can ask the ministers to appear. If the ministers do not want to come, they will have to bear the consequences of their decision to not appear before the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food.
This is a clear message the committee is sending to producers and farmers. We want to hear the ministers give us their version of history and tell us what is going on. We want the ministers to reassure the producers here or, at the very least, to come to discuss an agricultural file at the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food. In what way can the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food have an adverse effect on a case by asking the ministers to appear? If we refuse to have ministers appear before the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food, this would be a first.
Once again, I am asking my colleague to withdraw this amendment and to keep to the original motion and allow the three ministers to make the decision themselves; they will accept the political consequences of their decision. Why is the committee again playing the government's role by deciding who is to appear before it instead of letting the ministers decide? It is our role. We are independent and we want to hear the ministers. I am sure that all of my colleagues want to know what the ministers have to say on these files. Let's let things unfold as they should.
Liberal
NDP
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
I'd like to join with the Conservative members in asking Mr. Drouin to withdraw the amendment.
We're here in public. We're televised. The media is doing a live stream tweet marathon on this committee meeting, so the Canadian public and Canadian producers are fully aware of what is going on in this committee right now. I think we made a very clear case for why the minister needs to appear.
I cannot support this amendment. That doesn't mean I wouldn't welcome the chance to hear from CFIA and industry representatives, but we need to have the minister. That's where the buck stops.
I think it's incumbent upon this committee to at least make the invitation. I know ministers' schedules are very busy, but I think we've just heard today a willingness to modify our schedules to help them out. I'm going to be here in Ottawa this weekend. I'm sure all of us can find some time next week for a special committee meeting to accommodate the minister's schedule.
I would ask Mr. Drouin, here in this public setting, in front of the wider Canadian audience, to please withdraw this amendment so that we can have the ministers here before this committee. As I mentioned before, it's been since November 29 and we're almost in April. We need to have this legislative oversight of a very important department on a very important issue.
