Canadian Heritage Committee on March 30th, 2009

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

The most we could be doing right now would be voting on the amendment, which is to strike “at its earliest convenience”. We are not voting on the motion as amended, because if this passes, I'm going to propose another amendment.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Okay. The amendment is that we strike “at its earliest convenience” from the motion. That's the amendment.

(Amendment agreed to)

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

I'd like to speak to the motion, please.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Mr. Del Mastro.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to add after the word “appear” the words “as soon as possible”.

The reason I feel it's critical that we hear from them as soon as possible is that I think they have testimony that this committee should be prepared to hear as soon as possible. If they're not prepared to hear it as soon as possible, I'd like to know what their agenda is with not wanting to hear from them. We're here anyway. Let's ask them to be here as soon as possible so that we can hear what they have to say.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Chair, didn't we just rule on this? This is getting--

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

We did not just rule on this.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

We've been going back and forth a little bit here.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Call the question.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

There's been an amendment made by Mr. Del Mastro to the motion that after “calls to appear”, we add “as soon possible”.

(Amendment negatived)

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Ms. Glover, please.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

Mr. Chair, as a new member of Parliament, I am in awe that we, as parliamentarians who have a job to do for Canadians, are opting to do it half-assed and we're attempting to put forward a report that we all understand is not complete.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

That's not in your motion.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

My amendment is that we have a special meeting to invite the Canada Council here to meet with this heritage committee to provide the details and information that they have to provide that is relevant to this study.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Chair, that's another motion. We have a motion. You can't just start freeforming motions.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

If you want to refer to the original proposed motion, we could add after “to appear” the words “in the week of April 20”.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Can we just vote on the motion, Mr. Chair? They're freeforming now.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

We're not freeforming. This is how the committee works, Charlie.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

You spoke six times and I spoke twice.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

We voted on the motion. We voted on “as soon as possible”, “at the earliest possible convenience”, and now it's April 20. Can we just vote on the motion that we're going to bring the Canada Council?

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Schellenberger]

Okay.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

All right, Charlie, I get it. You don't want to hear from the Canada Council in the timeframe that would actually--

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

No, I'm totally supportive of that.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

No, you're not fully supportive, because you don't want to hear from them during a timeframe where we might be able to quote what they have to say--

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Is this going to be a ten percenter in my riding, Dean?