Evidence of meeting #5 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was going.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
That's why I got a little bit sidetracked, thinking that we have more or less incorporated what you just spoke about in the motion from Mr. Cullen.
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
Yes, I noticed that. But given the fact that Mr. Cullen's study is much broader—
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
—and that this is a subset of it, my fear would be that the clean tech element would get short shrift. Not intentionally, but it just would end up being that way because there are so many other elements that his study would entail.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
I think it'll be up to us to decide how we want to tackle it. That may not be the case, but we'll see how it goes forward.
Who's next?
Mr. Aldag, go ahead.
Liberal
John Aldag Liberal Cloverdale—Langley City, BC
As we were talking on this, I was comparing the one we had just accepted. Mr. Fast just explained what the difference was—that it's a narrower subset of Mr. Cullen's. My inclination, to keep it simple, would be to go with the one we've already voted on and know as a committee that it's on record that there is a concern that we want to get into the clean tech element of it. Perhaps that could be one piece of it.
I favour treating it as part of what we've already dealt with rather than as yet another motion. My sense is that it's covered with the one we just did.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
Okay.
We're going to try to speed it up now, because we're now running out of time.
Mr. Bossio.
Liberal
Mike Bossio Liberal Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON
This is just a quick comment to agree with John and with what you said earlier, but also to say that if the industry, science and technology committee does deal with clean tech, then we know that when we get to Mr. Cullen's study, we can treat it as such at that time. If it isn't covered by them, then once again, at that time we can say, it wasn't covered, so let's embed it into the process in a bolder way.
February 25th, 2016 / 12:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
That sounds good.
I'm going to call the question.
(Motion negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
Does anybody have any other motions to put on the table, before we move too quickly? There was one other one.
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
I believe I made the point earlier that the motion I proposed on migratory birds was actually subsumed in Mr. Amos' number one study.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
That's great. We have tried to be co-operative and supportive, and everybody is bringing the themes into the motions. I appreciate that work from Mr. Amos.
There was one other motion that was tabled before. Is there anything else that anyone wants to put on the table before we move to prioritization?
Mr. Eglinski.
Conservative
Jim Eglinski Conservative Yellowhead, AB
Could we ensure that the minutes include the comments made by Mr. Aldag and Mr. Bossio about using part of the technology that overlaps into Mr. Cullen's motion.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
It will be in the blues. There's no doubt about that.
We have a very short bit of time, maybe 10 minutes, to talk about the prioritization because we are trying to organize a subcommittee to call witnesses, so I want to know what we're going to be working on first, maybe in parallel.
Mr. Gerretsen.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
If you're looking for a motion to get this going, I would move that we prioritize the studies dealing with Mr. Amos' motion first and Mr. Cullen's motion second. All three of Mr. Amos' would be in the order that he's laid them out in his motion followed by Mr. Cullen's.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
You're looking to have it in order of one, two, three, and nothing working in parallel.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
If there's an opportunity for them to work in parallel then, of course, that's the best thing to do. It might take time to prepare something, in which case we can be working on something else.
It's going to be a consensus around the table. Mr. Fast wanted to deal with the one on parks and protected areas. We deal with that one first, then CEPA, then the commissioner's responsibilities in the Federal Sustainable Development Act, and then Mr. Cullen's on climate change.
Liberal
Mike Bossio Liberal Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON
I hate to differ with my fellow Liberal, but what has been expressed through the conversations by a number of us is that we'd like to see CEPA first, the assessment of Federal Sustainable Development Act second, and third, the assessment of the federally protected areas as the priority in the sequence in the motion.
Liberal
Liberal
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
Why don't we just have the discussion at the moment, if you don't mind, and then we'll move the motion in about five minutes.
Mr. Fast.
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
I very much appreciate Mr. Gerretsen's magnanimity. To perhaps further that even forward and hopefully invite consensus in committee, why don't we have the chair begin to contact witnesses and map out a plan going forward for two studies: the one that is listed number one and the one that is listed number two on Mr. Amos' list.
That way, if there is a week when we don't have witnesses on the one, we don't lose any time, and we move forward with the other. That's a reasonable approach to take and allows us to do this by full consensus. I'm assuming there would be full consensus here at the table.
Liberal