Canada-China Relations Committee on June 13th, 2022

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I agree with that recommendation and would love to hear the date the clerk would recommend for that.

I do wonder whether the subcommittee should meet prior to the first meeting, perhaps so we could make that decision.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Go ahead, Mr. Chong.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Just so we're clear here.... I don't quite understand. I think Mr. Oliphant suggested we all submit ideas or motions for various studies the committee could undertake before—

[A voice]

August 15.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Okay. Then, Mr. Chair, the idea is that the subcommittee would meet, after that point, to talk about the committee agenda for the fall sitting. Is that the idea? Would we have our first meeting with witnesses when we get back in September or would we have, Mr. Chair, an organizational meeting?

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

Mr. Chong, I would suggest we need an organizational meeting, because we're going to have to agree on it, unless we think we could do that virtually. However, I think there's an issue around virtual meetings. If we have a special meeting before the House resumes, it has to be in person. Am I right?

I'm getting a nod from the clerk. We're not allowed to have virtual meetings between now and when the House resumes on September 19. I would think we'd probably want to wait until some time in September.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Mr. Chair, just so that I understand, I think what's being proposed here—which sounds good to me—is that members would submit motions for ideas for studies some time before the middle of August, and discussions would take place among members informally before our first committee meeting in September. At that first committee meeting in September, we would have an organizational meeting, where we can hopefully come to a quick agreement on the committee's work plan for the fall sitting.

Mr. Chair, is that your understanding, as well, or am I missing something here?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

That's what I understood.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

I will just clarify that official virtual meetings can't happen after June 23, because the provision for hybrid sittings ends as of the 23rd. If we wanted to make it more of an official meeting, there would also be, I think, an issue with Parliament's resources—translation, and so on. There might be difficulties with holding a meeting prior to the House's coming back on September 19. This doesn't mean that you couldn't get together informally and have a discussion.

This also, by the way, raises another issue: In other committees I've been on, we've always created a subcommittee. The subcommittee goes off and does its work, and that work is brought back to the whole committee, and the whole committee does that work all over again. On those other committees, we actually dispensed with the subcommittee, because everybody wanted to be on it. That's just a thought. I think it's probably worth a test fly to see if that approach will work for us, because it would certainly be, I think, a more efficient use of our time—the whole committee getting together and ready to go.

Go ahead, Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe.

[Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe, Bloc, Lac-Saint-Jean, QC]

I don't want to look stupid, but, as I am new, I don't have as much experience as my honourable colleagues.

It seems to me that the committee has scheduled a meeting for next week. In that case, I do not understand why we should wait until mid-August to discuss the motions. Personally, I was ready to do so today. I was about to table three motions, but I was waiting for my friend Mr. Oliphant to make his proposals.

Personally, I am prepared to table motions. There is a meeting of the committee next week. So I see no reason why we should not take advantage of that two-hour period, during which the resources of the House will be available as planned. I think it would be disrespectful to the duties we perform. We are paid to work and there is a sitting next week. I am prepared to table motions tonight. If there are others, we will discuss them next week.

I do not understand why we are already talking about the end of the session when we have two hours of work ahead of us next week. I do not know whether my honourable colleagues have any comments to make on that. Personally, I am ready to start now. We have to agree now, so that we can save time. Otherwise, we will lose two hours next week. I'm not sure I understand that.

Mr. Oliphant could explain it to me.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

My thinking is that we have work that is ongoing at the subcommittee on international human rights. We have work that's going on at the foreign affairs committee. I think we might want the foreign affairs committee to transfer a piece of work to our committee that takes a little bit of negotiation—on Taiwan, for instance.

If we can look at what everybody has in mind, I think we'll see that it's going to take more than a week to do that. I know we have notices of motion from Monsieur Bergeron, but I have no idea really what's in the mind of the other parties. I'm not even sure it's in the mind of my colleagues here.

My sense is that we take our time to do this right. We would still need a meeting to approve the subcommittee report anyway, but I'm open. I don't know, but Mr. Chong might have an idea.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Mr. Chong.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

The reason I want to make a decision in early September is that the government has announced that it will bring forward a strategy for the Indo-Pacific region. If the government brings forward that strategy before the beginning of September, our committee could review that strategy; it could spend four or five meetings on it. However, if we make a decision now on Mr. Bergeron's proposal, it will not be possible to do so before the end of November or the end of December. That is one of the reasons why I want to wait until September to make a decision.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Ms. McPherson.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would just add that, considering the shortness of time before the end of this parliamentary session, we would want to have this committee be in a place so that we could be responsive to current events that conceivably will take place during the following three months.

Since we are not meeting for about three months, I wouldn't want to determine a work plan in June that may be inappropriate in September and October.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe.

[Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe, Bloc, Lac-Saint-Jean, QC]

My colleagues raise some very good points. However, some things are certain.

For example, Mr. Oliphant mentioned Taiwan. By the way, with regard to the Subcommittee on International Human Rights, which Mr. Oliphant was talking about, the meeting was supposed to take place on Tuesday, but it was cancelled this week. In my view, we can stop talking about it.

As to what is going to happen over the next three months, there's one study that everyone wants to talk about, which is the one on Taiwan. Mr. Oliphant said that and I think that's pretty clear.

There is also the fact that we heard evidence, but our study was not completed, because of the elections. We never wrote a report based on the testimony we received. I think this is a priority of the committee and it does not change what is going to happen in the next three months.

In terms of what happens next, I may not have the opportunity to table my three motions. However, I believe that two of them will garner unanimity in the committee, and I would like to table them today. Then we would not have to adopt seven, eight or nine motions. As Ms. McPherson and Mr. Chong said, we can wait for the next three months. However, I would already table at least two of my motions, which have been circulated to the members of the committee. I am convinced that they will be unanimously supported. So we will not have worked for nothing.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Mr. Chair, I think there is no problem with having a meeting next week, if that is the will of the committee, to discuss the schedule of this committee in the fall.

I don't have a problem with meeting next week to talk about a potential schedule if there's an agreement about doing some things in September, provided we don't lock in the entire fall sitting. I'm open to meeting next week to see if there's a consensus among members.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Mr. Fragiskatos.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

I would say that's in the purview of this subcommittee. Discussions of scheduling always has been. I've come across this before where sometimes at committee the idea of the whole committee discussing a schedule happens. I don't find it to be that effective. We should leave that to the subcommittee. I understand that my colleague raises the idea in good faith, but based on experience, there are other ways of doing it, and the subcommittee ought to take it up.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Mr. Oliphant.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

I think there will be unanimity on having a discussion and study on Taiwan. My concern is that the study that was done in the previous Parliament, I would say, is out of date.

Many things have happened, including in the last three weeks, in the straits, as well as in the area around Taiwan. The foreign affairs committee has also had one meeting on Taiwan that is a bit more up to date, and the testimony could be transferred to this committee.

However, I don't think that the meetings we had in the previous Parliament are completely relevant right now. Things have especially changed on the security front, even in the last five days.

We need to go at it cautiously and carefully, and ensure that we're doing this study at the right time. We also need to ensure that every member of the committee has a chance to put forward ideas.

I'm still not in favour of our adopting a work plan tonight. Anyone can always move a motion, but in the spirit of collaboration, it would be much better if we work together and put everything into one batch of motions and have the subcommittee sort it out.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Thank you, Mr. Oliphant.

Mr. Dubourg.

[Emmanuel Dubourg, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I think the comments made by my colleagues are all valid, indeed. I want to say to my colleague Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe that it is true that we have just adopted the routine motions requiring that we table motions 48 hours in advance. However, under the proposal currently on the table, made by Mr. Oliphant, Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe may table his motions today or next week.

The objective behind this is for the subcommittee to have all these motions so that it can prioritize them and then propose a work plan to the committee as a whole. This does not mean that the important motions that Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe wants to bring forward will not be analyzed.

Given what may actually happen over the summer, the key is that all parties table all their motions and we do this work once and for all based on the priorities that will have been established.

That's it, Mr. Chair.