Canadian Heritage Committee on May 31st, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You asked me, Ms. Thomas, to ask the clerk a question and I'm doing it.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Wonderful. Thank you so much, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Maybe if you allowed me to speak, you might understand what I'm saying. Let me finish my sentence, please, Ms. Thomas.

Now I'll go to you, Clerk.

[The Clerk]

Yes, Madam Chair.

I have Mr. Julian, Ms. Thomas and Mr. Nater on the speaking list.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you. How long do we have this room, Madam Clerk?

[The Clerk]

We're usually good to extend by about 15 minutes. I will have to check for anything beyond that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Can you please do that? Thank you.

Now we'll go to Mr. Julian.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Very briefly, Madam Chair, I think your idea of extending one of our meetings an hour this week to get the 20 hours is important, and I think the Friday deadline is reasonable. All parties have been working on their amendments all along, so it's not as if we'll wait until the final witness before we start working on amendments. That's not how this place functions.

This is a reasonable proposal. We may not get agreement immediately, but we have a number of other meetings where we can continue that discussion off-line. I think that, in our case, we will be getting the amendments in this Friday for 4 p.m., and I expect that most parties will be doing that, because it's a simple matter of respect for our employees.

I agree with Mr. Nater about the additional hour and I support that request from the Conservatives. Let's add that extra hour. Let's have the deadline for Friday and let's continue the discussions when we get a chance over the course of the next three or four committee meetings today, tomorrow and Thursday.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you, Mr. Julian.

I think the next person up is Ms. Thomas.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Thank you, Chair. I appreciate being acknowledged.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

I always acknowledge you, Ms. Thomas, if your hand is up.

Thank you. Go ahead.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Thank you.

Madam Chair, you talked about the importance of looking ahead, and, sure, I think we can all agree to that. That's no problem. We can look ahead and anticipate what's to come. However, what I believe is perhaps unreasonable in this scenario is that we're being asked to put forward amendments without yet having heard all of the testimony that is to be brought forward to this committee. We don't know what those remaining witnesses might bring forward with regard to recommendations for amendments. There seems to be a lack of any sort of logic to enforce that or to make sure that we bring forward amendments before hearing from those witnesses.

I would highlight for the committee that the agreement we came to was not for a maximum of 20 hours. Nor was it a hard stop at 20 hours. It was for a minimum of 20 hours of witness time. I can appreciate that the last hour within that minimum framework will be granted— that is the right thing to do—so thank you, but also, let's acknowledge the fact that there are many more witnesses who have asked to come before this committee. Perhaps it is worth acknowledging that and seeing if it might be possible to give additional time.

For example, we have a bill in front of us that is going to have a direct impact on places or companies like Apple or Amazon or Roku, none of these has been invited as a witness, as far as I can tell, thus far. I'm wondering if there would be opportunity to bring forward witnesses such as the ones I have listed just now.

In addition to that, I think we as a committee have a responsibility to make sure that multiple voices are represented here on behalf of Canadians. That is our job. To rush this through without giving a chance for a variety of witnesses—including the ones I have listed—to be heard from seems irresponsible. Again, I would just encourage the committee to perhaps consider going above and beyond that minimum threshold of 20 hours.

The other thing I will state is this: It stands out to me that the CRTC chair, Mr. Scott, testified in this committee a couple of weeks ago, at which point he stated that the CRTC does have the ability to regulate user-generated content within the framework of this piece of legislation, Bill C-11, as it stands. That is interesting to me, and to many Canadians, because there is a charter statement that says otherwise and deems this bill charter-compliant.

The CRTC chair Mr. Scott and the charter statement cannot both be true. It would seem, then, that a new charter statement is required at this committee before we can move forward and consider the bill in clause-by-clause, because if in fact this bill, as it stands, is not found to be charter-compliant, then that would need to be revisited. Again, this committee would not be doing its diligence or functioning in a diligent manner if it did not take that into account. I would encourage this committee as well to call for a new charter statement before we continue proceeding to clause-by-clause consideration.

Madam Chair, in summary, I'm asking for two things. I'm asking that we consider the fact that when we discussed hours granted, we said a minimum of 20 hours, so there is opportunity to hear from additional witnesses who would like their voices to be added here at this committee.

The second consideration that I am putting before you as chair and the rest of the members of this committee is that a new charter statement is required in order to ensure that this bill is in fact compliant with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Again, I will highlight that there is an incongruence between the testimony of Mr. Scott and what the charter statement says.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you.

I think the next person whose hand was up is Mr. Waugh.

[The Clerk]

It's actually Mr. Nater.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you.

John.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

I was going to cede my time to Mr. Waugh, but I'll just offer a few comments on what Ms. Thomas just said, and that's to do with the charter statement.

This afternoon we'll be hearing from the CRTC. They are, obviously, the entity that will be implementing this piece of legislation. They're the ones who will be granted the regulatory powers to do any number of things. Again, to commit to a deadline of this Friday, without even hearing from those implementing the legislation, I think, is premature.

To comments from Ms. Thomas about the charter statement, I think that is a troubling scenario, where an assumption is made and that assumption has been dispelled by the chair of the CRTC. I think we need clarity on that, whether that's an updated charter statement from the Minister of Justice or whether it's the minister appearing before this committee to make the argument in terms of that charter statement and the continued prevalence of that statement, given the testimony we have heard.

Again, I'm not ready to commit to a deadline. I think we can all have conversations off-line over the next little while and see if there might not be a scenario that we can come to. I think, first and foremost, we need to hear from the witnesses. Until such time that we've heard from our witnesses, then we are not ready or able to commit to a deadline to have amendments.

I'll leave that at this point for now, and look forward to comments.

I believe Mr. Waugh has some comments to make.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Yes, as chair, I did recognize Mr. Waugh, Mr. Nater.

We have Mr. Waugh, please.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just received on my Twitter account that this person submitted a brief to the Canadian heritage committee and it does not yet appear on the committee web page. I'm sure there's a number of them.

I would say, Madam Chair, how disrespectful for future witnesses if we move ahead with the amendments before many of them have a chance to have a say. Put yourself in their position. The amendments have been made, yet they haven't been invited to the committee hearings. That would dampen anybody, moving forward, would you not think? If I know all the amendments are already made, and I come the next day, what good am I?

I think that's very disrespectful on the part of our committee, all of us sitting around, that we wouldn't give everyone a fair chance to have their say, and then they can move on. I think I'm right on that, Madam Chair. If I came into the room as a witness, and I already knew that all the amendments were made, it would be pretty disrespectful to me to go ahead, because although you say that what I say at the hearing can alter the amendments, I'm not too convinced as a witness that it would alter them. You've already made up your mind. That's the point that I think all of us should think about—respect. We should be respectful of all of our witnesses coming forward.

I would like to also, Madam Chair, move to adjourn.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

The clerk did not get an opportunity to tell us how long we have this meeting for, but we do have a hard time coming up very soon for question period, so I will entertain the motion to adjourn.

The motion has been made. There is no debate, so we will adjourn until 3:30 this afternoon. Thank you.