Bill C-2 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) Committee on Oct. 30th, 2007

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Pursuant to Standing Order 113(3), I would like to call the meeting to order. This is the first meeting of the Legislative Committee on Bill C-2, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and to make consequential amendments to other Acts.

I feel like the genie in Aladdin, because there are a few quid pro quos that we need to go through first. According to practice, in my role as the chair of this committee, I will act as a neutral arbitrator of the proceedings, ensuring orderly conduct of debate and, obviously, careful attention to the clause-by-clause study of the bill.

I first would like to thank the committee and respective parties for their support in allowing me to chair this legislative committee. Because of the short time this committee has been given to study the bill, I shall do my best to ensure that we do this in as efficient a manner as we possibly can. We'll have our work cut out for us if we are going to complete our study by November 22, but I think we'll be able to meet that part of the motion and certainly move forward. I give you my assurances that I will act as a neutral arbitrator and chair this as effectively and efficiently as I possibly can.

There are two people I would like to introduce before we get into housekeeping matters. The first is the clerk of our committee, Christine Lafrance. She'll be responsible for the administrative and procedural aspects of the committee's work. Our legislative clerk, from whose work we will benefit, is Mr. Mike Macpherson. Mr. Macpherson will be an advisor to the committee regarding the admissibility of amendments.

Before we begin the consideration of routine motions, I would like to confirm the fact that the committee is ready to hear from the justice minister this afternoon in a televised meeting. Obviously all of our proceedings will be televised. If I could see agreement and general concurrence that the minister could drop by and present, that would be appreciated.

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

All right.

I don't know that we've actually nailed down a time for that.

Ms. Jennings.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

The notice I received said 3:30.

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

The one comment I would have on that is that I know the Minister of Justice would like to be at the fiscal update that's going to be taking place, I believe, at 4 o'clock. I would propose that we meet after that fiscal update, as soon as it's over, until bells at 5:30. We have a 5:45 vote tonight. I hope members would agree that we could squeeze an hour in there, between 4:30 and 5:30, and if people still had more questions for the minister--I've spoken with the minister--he's willing to come back right after votes. We don't know exactly how long votes will take, but he's willing to come back right after votes. Hopefully we could wrap things up in between the fiscal update and votes, if that's agreeable to everybody.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

I would just like to understand why it is important for a minister who does not have an economic portfolio to be present for an economic update. Is the government not claiming that C-2 Bill is the priority? Should we not start at 3:30 p.m? I am not opposed to starting at 4:30 p.m., but I confess to being a little surprised that the minister, who does not have an economic portfolio, wants to be present for an economic update. I am not against starting an hour later, but I would prefer to start at 3:30 p.m. I would just like someone to explain what contribution the Minister of Justice will make, since industry or finance are not matters that concern him at all.

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

You can certainly put that question to the minister when he's here, but I think the minister would like to be there for the fiscal update. Many of us would like to see the fiscal update. We didn't know about this when the original schedule went out, but to try to accommodate hearing from the minister today--as I think we all want to do--there does seem to be that window of time in between the fiscal update and votes in which the minister will be able to be here. So if everyone is agreeable to that, we can put our questions to the minister in between those times.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

I have Ms. Jennings, Mr. Comartin, and Mr. Lee.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Yes, this is a little wrinkle. The notice I received was that the minister was prepared to appear before the committee today between 3:30 and 5:30. On that basis, I was more than willing to vacate my schedule in order to be available to hear from the minister in a continuous fashion today. With the information that we're now receiving from his parliamentary secretary, it appears he's not available at 3:30, but would make himself available for a short period before the economic update and then following the votes.

I don't think that is necessarily the ideal situation in order to hear from the minister. I would ask the parliamentary secretary if the minister would be available tomorrow afternoon--and if not then, possibly on Thursday morning, just to give you an example--at let's say 3:30 or 4 or 4:30, for at least an hour-and-a-half block of time in a continuous fashion, not the disjointed fashion being suggested.

To echo our colleague Monsieur Ménard, the economic update is the economic minister. All of us may wish to have the luxury of participating and hearing that economic update. However, if the justice minister, whose primary responsibility is justice, can make himself available for the time that was initially sent out through the chair's office today, then I would recommend that he do so. Many of us changed our schedule based on the notice we received.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

I will let Mr. Comartin go next, but just to clarify, the notice that did go out, Ms. Jennings, is correct. It was for today from 3:30 to 5:30, with 3:30 to 4:30 being the minister and 4:30 to 5:30 being ministry officials. That was the notice that was sent out.

Mr. Comartin.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

I am the same as Ms. Jennings in that I altered my schedule. I cancelled out of the House leaders meeting, which I usually attend for my party, at 3:30. I'm also scheduled to speak to the private member's bill after the votes this evening, the bill to amend the charter. So I have some difficulty.

I would support Ms. Jennings' position that we ask the minister to come tomorrow afternoon from 3:30 to 5:30.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Mr. Lee.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Chair, our members of Parliament normally try to accommodate ministers who have very busy schedules, but in this case, the reason offered for us altering our schedules and shoehorning something in at the very end of the day, divided by a vote in the middle, is that the Minister of Justice wants to listen to a speech from the Minister of Finance.

Now, I know this Minister of Justice is not a groupie of the Minister of Finance.

I may be a little out of date on this, but I also had heard that the speech might not even be happening in the House of Commons, in which case, I don't know where the heck the Minister of Justice is going to be able to listen to the speech. He may be sitting somewhere with a transistor radio.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

It's at the press gallery.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

The press gallery?

Well, that's a great place for the Minister of Finance for a couple of hours. I think he ought to be right here with our business. I don't think there's any need for any member around this table to go out and have to listen on the radio to War of the Worlds or the next speech from the Minister of Finance or any government minister. If it were a House obligation, maybe, but our committees normally sit while the House is continuing its business.

I'm going to suggest to committee members that one of the underlying reasons here...and I'm not criticizing it. But in order to maximize media coverage of all things governmental, it would be perhaps a poor choice to have this committee televised and ongoing at the same time as the Minister of Finance makes his speech. You'll understand why I wouldn't want to play that game.

I am suggesting that we either have the meeting at 3:30 and do our work, or reschedule it in the way Ms. Jennings has suggested. That way I think we'll do a better job of our work.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

I have Mr. Harris, Mr. Keddy, and then Mr. Moore to hopefully wrap up.

[Dick Harris, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I guess I'm just a little bit surprised at some of the comments.

Mr. Ménard, Mr. Lee, and Ms. Jennings have been here as long as I have. If you're being honest, you cannot say that this has never happened before, and it's something that is possibly expected when you have a minister coming to a committee meeting. We've been on hundreds of committee meetings over the last 15 years, and this is definitely not the first time a message has come from the minister's office at the last moment that something has come up that the minister has to do and can we sort of rearrange it.

Honestly, on every committee I've ever sat on, without exception, we've always done whatever we could to accommodate a minister's timetable. I am speaking of the previous government, the Liberal minister's timetable--in every case. To be honest with yourself, this is not unusual. To be honest with yourself again, you know in the past you have always done everything you could to accommodate a minister. This is not an unusual request. To question why a minister has to ask for a little exception to his schedule in making changes...I can't remember a committee I've ever served on where this happened, where we went into a long debate as to why the minister couldn't make it, for a legitimate reason. The minister says he or she can't make it. We've accepted that in the past. It's precedent-setting.

I think this conversation is a little unusual. Why don't we just think about our past committee history and make accommodation for the minister to see us today at the time he's available?

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

We've had a chance to talk about this and we're going to have to come to a decision.

After you speak, Mr. Keddy, I think we should either come to an agreement or we'll need a motion put forward to have the minister here.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margaret's, NS]

I'll be extremely brief, Mr. Chair.

I concur with what Mr. Harris has said.

I think the issue here is that regardless of the reason the minister finds himself in a quandary where he can't be here at 4 o'clock...he can be here for the half hour, my understanding is the half hour prior, and then come back after the fiscal update at 5:30 or after votes. Am I correct in that? So we would still have an hour of the minister's time today.

I've looked at this agenda, and like the rest of the members here, I have spent a lot of time sitting around committee tables. We have a very ambitious agenda and a very small window of time. Quite frankly, we may not be able to get the minister when it's convenient for us. If we can do it today--we have him for half an hour and we can get him for the second half hour--my suggestion would be that we try to accommodate his schedule for today.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

I have three more people. We're going to have to come to grips with this.

Mr. Moore.

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

Mr. Chair, we had originally talked about, I believe, 3:30 to 5:30. The minister is willing to be here during that time slot, from 4:30-ish to 5:30, when we have votes. Anything anyone did to change their schedule is not in any way impacted by this change. It would still be there but just for the second half of that hour that we originally scheduled. The minister was going to be here for an hour and then officials for an hour. The minister will be here for approximately one hour.

If the committee wishes the minister to appear after votes....I've been on enough committees to know that we were oftentimes interrupted by votes in the last session. We'd be in our deliberations. Votes would have been scheduled. We'd come back after votes. It happened many times in the last session.

The minister has said he's willing to come back right after votes, so I would hope the members would try to accommodate. It's not really a major shift from what we had originally scheduled anyway.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

Mr. Ménard.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Chair, I would like us to understand each other's position, and I will state mine. We understand that ministers are very busy people; we are not disputing that. We are just a little surprised that a minister feels the need to give priority to listening to a speech that does not seem related to his mandate, when we think that he would be more useful at the committee.

That said, I think that we should start off on the right foot. You are well aware that the opposition has cooperated in bringing the committee together as quickly as possible. Mr. Chair, I move that we hear from the minister from 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. That means that his officials would come from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. and that we would wrap up our work the moment the bell begins to ring for votes. I am ready to move that we hear from the minister, but I hope that he will be told that we would like to have been a priority in his schedule, because the government has constantly told us that this is the most important of its bills. It is the opposition parties and their leaders who have arranged for the committee to meet as quickly as possible.

So I move--seconded I think by Ms. Jennings--that we hear the minister at 4:30 p.m. as arranged, and that his officials appear at 3:30 p.m.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Dykstra]

If I understand correctly, the motion is that we would have ministry officials appear from 3:30 to 4:30, with the minister appearing and presenting from 4:30 to 5:30, at least up until the vote. That's a little different from how we normally would do things, but it certainly would be within the timeframe we have.

Ms. Jennings, to the motion.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Yes, to the motion. First of all, yes. I would, however, propose a slight amendment, which would be that the minister also agree to come back before the committee moves to clause-by-clause, if needed, with his public servants, if this committee deems it necessary. That's the only thing I would add, and we would be prepared to support Mr. Ménard's motion.