Environment Committee on May 10th, 2016

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Let's make sure we at least have enough time at the end to vote on this.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

That's what I'm worried about, so how about just another minute? Then we'll have to draw it to a close, I think.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

I was going to say thank you. I think I've made my point that this is a hostile act by a majority party against smaller parties. While it is personal in its impact on me, I want all of you to know as individuals and friends that I do not take it personally.

I think you're about to pass a motion that will hurt the fabric of democracy, and I think you've been told to do it.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Thank you very much, Ms. May.

Mr. Cullen.

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

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Ms. May covered the history well because this is not a move that we haven't seen before. It was just a different party doing it last time to stop independents and other MPs from moving motions at report stage. You'd wonder why you would even have that stage. I'm curious why the government hasn't gone through the proper procedure, which is to reform the way Parliament works as opposed to this ham-fisted approach and going committee by committee to change this procedure. I'd be curious to hear from the government members the valid reason for doing this, if there is one, because I assume this isn't Mark's authorship. It would be good for this committee to hear about our committee business and not this universal plan that's being promulgated by the Prime Minister's office.

I was looking back, because it's good to look back. There's a 32-point plan issued by Mr. Trudeau called “Real Change” about reforming Parliament and democracy, making committees more independent, and not allowing the Prime Minister's office to dictate what does and doesn't happen. That's a bit rich coming from the House yesterday when we had a motion to end debate not on one but two bills simultaneously. I'm not even sure you guys tried that before. It's an interesting new tactic. The Liberals in the House applauded and laughed at that particular motion, both very important bills, one to the RCMP and one to our budget.

I'm surprised because it doesn't speak to the spirit of what Mr. Trudeau has committed to. On the scale of personal...and I'll end here, Chair, because I assume members of the committee whom I also consider friends didn't put this together themselves but were asked to do it. The language is eerily similar to what's been happening at other committees. A pretty good argument would need to be made that this suddenly spurted from your intelligence and imagination independently and it just happens to have fallen on all 20 committees of Parliament simultaneously. It's a bit much, and it's certainly not in the spirit of what was promised on October 19 last year.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

All right, thank you very much.

Mr. Gerretsen.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

As a matter of clarification and perhaps privilege, I want to take the opportunity to say that I was in the House yesterday when that occurred. Mr. Cullen was there, and he mentioned at that time and here that a number of Liberals laughed. I didn't hear that. I certainly wasn't one of them, but I can appreciate that our perspectives on it might be a little different.

In terms of this particular motion, this is the arena in which the real work happens. When we get to the House, it's a lot more challenging to put forward a motion. If you're genuinely interested in affecting the outcome of the reports that leave this particular venue and go to the House, this is the place where you have the biggest impact and the biggest opportunity to do it.

I've had the opportunity to get to know the other members of the committee who are not on my side of the House, both on this committee and the other committee I'm in, and I have a much better working relationship with them as a result of the fact that we're able to sit in this type of environment and contribute to the meaningful work that comes out of here.

I respect what Ms. May mentioned about the difficulty of getting from one committee to the other and I appreciate that concern, and hopefully, there is a way in the future that we'll be able to work around that concern.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

We're short on time, so if no one has anything more to say, we'll call the question.

(Motion agreed to)

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much, Ms. May, for taking the time to run over and share with us.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Thank you for giving me the time to speak. Obviously, I don't disagree with Mark that committee work is important. Committee work is really important, and I'm not being asked to sit on this committee as a full member.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Thank you.

We have one more motion.

Mr. Fast.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I believe we have talked about splitting this into two motions to ensure we have an opportunity to vote on each element of it.

The first was self-explanatory. We had talked about perhaps reviewing the time allocated for the rounds, moving each question from six minutes to seven minutes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I think everybody's had a lot of time to have a look at it. I know we're short of time, one of us has to go, and we want to make the vote. The first part is changing the time to be more like PROC. Is there anything anybody wants to say on that before the vote?

Go ahead, Mr. Gerretsen.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

All I will say is that I'm on another committee, the defence committee, along with Mr. Fisher, where we have seven minutes and then five minutes, and I find during that second round we are so much more limited. Personally, I enjoy the way this committee operates. I'm happy with it the way it is.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I'm going to call the vote on changing the times, as recognized in the motion.

(Motion negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

The second piece of your motion is:

That all committee members or associate members speak and ask questions of witnesses before a non-committee member present may speak and ask questions of witnesses.

That may be something Ms. May.... She's had the chance to come and we've shared time with her, but this motion will impact maybe how we do that.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

It was certainly appropriate for Ms. May to be able to speak to something that so directly impacts her.

The second part of the motion, which is now a separate motion, speaks to the issue of courtesy to each one of our members who come prepared for these meetings. We do a lot of work behind the scenes to make sure that we read the supporting materials, that we work through some good questions to ask. I get the sense this committee has been working better than most of us expected. It hasn't reverted to partisanship yet to any significant degree.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I hope that continues.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

This would simply ensure that every member of this committee gets a chance to ask a question before a non-member gets to ask a question. I'd hate to see one or more of us cut out of an opportunity to speak. I know it was raised the time Ms. May was here. She was actually ceded her time by one of the Liberal members of the committee, but even that.... Out of courtesy, wouldn't we want to cede our time to another member of this committee rather than to someone who is not a member of this committee?

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I think your point is well taken.

Mr. Cullen.

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

Very briefly, I recall ceding some time to Ms. May as well at some point.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Yes, you did.

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

I hear what Ed's saying, totally, just in terms of respecting committee members, but I just don't often see the occasion where my action in doing that was then going to limit somebody else around the table from asking a question. I just simply gave up my time, and if that meant I lost that round and didn't get another round, then I was okay with it.

I couldn't see the imagination of a schedule in which my doing that, or any member doing that, would then bump some other member from asking a question.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

You would if you had two panels.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

It might happen, and we've had a couple of instances this week that have caused that to be a reality.

Mr. Gerretsen.