Subcommittee on Agenda and Procedure Committee on April 12th, 2016

[The Chair (Mrs. Deborah Schulte (King—Vaughan, Lib.)), Liberal, Deb Schulte]

We have a couple of things that we need to do. We need to pick witnesses. We need to make sure that we have all agreed on the direction we're going in the next couple of months. I sent out a few emails on that.

We agreed at the last subcommittee meeting that we would go in a certain order, or at least we had said that we would bring that forward to committee. Then it all went out the window when several things occurred and the minister couldn't come on the date, so all the dates started to change. Subsequently, I sent out an email with a suggestion.

Let's just make sure we're all on the same page with the work plan for the next couple of months.

You all have the calendar now. Today and Thursday is our meeting on the Federal Sustainable Development Act, and we will be bringing forward a report at the end of that session on Thursday. If you have any ideas, make sure you come prepared for that on Thursday, if you don't mind.

The next week we start with the minister on the 19th, so be prepared for that. On the 21st we get started on our federally protected areas study. I think we've all agreed on that. On May 3, 5, 10, and 12 we'll stay on that subject.

I'm just going to go through the calendar to make sure that everybody is agreed on it, because this is what we're going to bring forward for approval on Thursday. I don't think we ever actually adopted our calendar. We proposed it in the subcommittee and then didn't adopt it. I remember your discussion saying that it didn't even work anymore, so we needed to redo it. We had the meeting for the 24th cancelled and everything got shifted.

As I say, I just want to make sure we're all on the same page.

We had thought that the commissioner would bring forward her spring reports to us on May 31, but that is actually the day she's tabling her reports, so that's not going to work. We're just going to switch the FSDA from June 2 to the 31st, and then she will come on June 2. We have the consultation for the report. We are switching that to the 31st.

Shall we just leave it at that for now? I think if we get too far ahead of ourselves, we may end up having something else come up. Let's just get through April, and then we can look to what we're trying to do in the rest of June. Is that all right with everybody—or what do you think?

Go ahead, Nathan.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I think the sequence of events works well just in terms of the commissioner's coming down with her report at the end of the month and then our dealing with it a couple of days later. I think it would be timely. Then we'll be able to wrap up the report on FSDA within the month of May, hopefully. I looked at the blank slots here, and I want to get my numbers right, and perhaps you can help me, Chair, if I go through this calendar. We have five on protected areas. We'll have the environment commissioner, we'll have a day with the minister. Is it right that we'll have four on CEPA to this point? We've done two, with two more planned.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Yes.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I was going to suggest that we start to allot—and I know you want to be cautious about how far ahead we do this—the climate change motion to the month of June, unless there's some objection to that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I have my comments. We have a lot of balls in the air. I think we are very bold already in trying to move things along simultaneously. I think I mentioned this before when you raised this: I'm concerned that we have so much on the go that we will lose our focus on what we're trying to achieve in the committee. I'd like to try to get some things wrestled to the ground so that we see success.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I appreciate that, but I guess what I'm seeing in this calendar is that we are ticking off the boxes of our work plan, in the sense that we'll have had five on the protected areas and we'll have wrapped up the FSDA study in the previous month. We'll have seen the minister, and by the 2nd we'll have seen the environment commissioner. So I appreciate the number of balls in the air and our not wanting to lose focus, but if FSDA is done, we'll have done four on the CEPA review, which is a year legislated for the review and the act. We'll have done four by the time the clock has started.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

It's a big act.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I understand, but I feel that we're ahead of the game, frankly, on that one. The committee has a year. We're not going to spend an entire year's worth of committee meetings on the act, I hope.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

No, absolutely not.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

So we're good on that. It feels like we're ticking our work boxes.

It's just the motion that the committee already agreed to. The guiding motion that I keep going back to is the one we voted on. The element that has not yet been covered is clean technology and climate change. In this regard, I don't understand the concerns about the balls in the air....

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I'm just going to say this and then open it up to thoughts from anybody else. The motion that we agreed to in principle, unanimously, was that we would do.... An FSDA strategy and act have jumped ahead; we thought that was going to be third. I actually thought when I heard the comments around the room that we were looking to complete those first two before we moved on to anything else. The strategy got jumped in there. I agree that it wiggled its way in, so why can't we wiggle something else in?

I really do want to hear from the other representatives around the table about what we want to do. I don't mind, but I'm just mindful that we will then have three things on the go. I mean, hey, we're a great committee, and there's a lot we can do, but we'll have three things in process, and it gets to be a bit of a challenge with witnesses and staying with the thought and the theme. As you're listening to witnesses and staying cohesive in your thinking and then you start bringing in yet another big project that we're looking at, it might get more challenging for everybody to keep aligned with what's happening in the different work packages that we're trying to do.

Does anybody else have any comments? Those are just mine.

Mr. Aldag.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

I have a couple of points for clarification.

I assume we're going to have reports or some sort of summary on the FSDA and the protected areas. Was the plan to try to do both of those?

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Yes. What we're intending to do is have drafting instructions this Thursday for the federal sustainability development act, and listen, on what we've heard today and the questions from you and others about how broad it could be and whether we're going to be able to do all of that in the short period of time that we're trying to do it in, let's just keep trying.

Then we will go on to the protected areas. I don't believe, but we will know once we progress, that the time we have given for this is adequate to complete it. I don't believe that four sessions would actually complete it. That's a very big project too.

Oh, I'm sorry, there are five. There are five weeks, five sessions. Will we actually be able to get to where we want to make recommendations at that point? I don't know. If you think we can, that's great, and then we will do drafting instructions and we'll go through the process that we're doing on the FSDA with that one too.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Yes. The point I'm raising is simply that if we're trying to conclude a couple of those, there may be a day or two, the seventh, or the ninth, or something like that, when we may need to tie it up. I agree. I'd like to get into that next piece at some point.

There's another question I have. Do we know when we're actually ending in June? It's showing six unallocated weeks, and I'm hearing rumours already that we may be done after the ninth.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I just heard yesterday that we may be going into July, so I don't think we know what we're doing.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Okay. That's where we can pencil things in or...?

[A voice]

It's like this every year.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

This is what it's like?

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Yes, it's about now that the rumours start about how we're going to end early, and then we end almost exactly.... We may be a half a day or a day early. This has been the 11-year tradition.

You guys may be different and want to cut class early—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

—but it's not the tradition around Parliament that I've seen so far.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

No, we don't. I just wondered if anybody knew what—

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

The rumours are great. I think people invent them. They're wishful thinking.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

So then the theory is that if we build in a couple near the end, if that's what you're talking about, it would give us a chance to at least introduce it. I'd be happy with that and to give it some thinking time over the summer. It's just that if we do get cut early, then we risk it.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

It's a risk I'm willing to take.