Information & Ethics Committee on March 8th, 2012

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

It's interesting that we do some things in camera, Madam Chair, and some things out of camera, depending on what the Conservatives opposite want to do. Maybe they'd like to go in camera. Maybe Mr. Del Mastro, when he calls Mr. Carroll here, would like to take that discussion in camera instead of trying to drag this gentleman through the media circus and through this.

I would like to see, when we get to that stage, whether Mr. Del Mastro would actually like to go in camera so that we don't impugn, or penalize, this individual any more than he already has been.

Getting back to the motion at hand here, I like how Mr. Del Mastro talks about public attacks on a member of Parliament.

You know, I'm new to this place. I was elected in 2008. It was a very interesting time in my first couple of years here. We made some changes. My little party was going through some tough times. We elected a new leader by the name of Michael Ignatieff. It was very interesting. As soon as Mr. Ignatieff was elected, we had some personal attacks come from the Conservative Party: “He's just visiting”. That was their famous line: “He's just visiting”. He went away to university. He did well for himself. But they liked to attack that he was just visiting. They love public attacks when that comes forward.

Then their next line was, “He's not in it for you”.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

No.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Am I wrong?

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Point of order, Mr. Del Mastro.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

“He didn't come back for you”--please.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

That's not a point of order, Mr. Del Mastro.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

He didn't come back for you. He's not in it for you.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Mr. Andrews, please direct your comments through the chair, please.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I'm sorry. Thank you. Keep reminding me, please, Madam Chair.

It's interesting that they went through this public attack on a member of Parliament. They had no problem with it. Bring it on. As long as we can do it, it's all right, but if anyone else talks about anything, it's a public attack, and we shouldn't be doing it. It's bad.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

We didn't hide it, like your guy did.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I think Mr. Butt is on the speakers list, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

If I could interrupt, gentlemen and madam, if you wish to be on the speakers list, could you please signal your intention to the clerk?

Thank you, Mr. Del Mastro. We'll put you on the list.

Otherwise, I would appreciate a little order in the room.

Mr. Andrews, please continue.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

These public attacks continued. As we say back home, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. We'll see. We'll just leave that one for the time being.

I'm glad that Mr. Butt interjected, as well, because I'd like to respond to some of the things he added to the debate last week under this. Just to recap, for everybody's memory:

Madam Chairman, I don't think the member has read the motion, because the motion is about House of Commons resources. That's what this motion is for the committee to investigate, not all this other wild, crazy stuff.

This whole motion is wild and crazy stuff. I find that ironic.

It's one meeting, one individual, where we're asking him to come forward to talk about his use of House of Commons resources in this issue.

He didn't think the member had read the motion. I don't know how much reading Mr. Butt has done since he's been here, Madam Chair.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Lots.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I'm glad he's indicating “lots”, because one of the things we use our resources for is the mandate of committees—and the mandate of this committee.

I'd like to look at Standing Order 108(3)(h) of the House of Commons, where it talks about “Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics shall include, among other matters:”

the review of and report on the effectiveness, management and operation together with the operational and expenditure plans relating to the Information Commissioner;

the review of and report on the effectiveness, management and operation together with the operational and expenditure plans relating to the Privacy Commissioner;

the review of and report on the effectiveness, management and operation together with the operational and expenditure plans relating to the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner;

the review of and report on reports of the Privacy Commissioner, the Information Commissioner and the Conflict of Interest and the Ethics Commissioner with respect to his or her responsibilities under the Parliament of Canada Act relating to public office holders and on reports tabled pursuant to the Lobbyists Registration Act, which shall be severally deemed permanently referred to the Committee immediately after they are laid upon the Table;

Then it goes on a little further, putting out the mandate of our committee.

Our mandate at committee has no dealing with the House of Commons resources. That's better referred to in the other committee, the parliamentary affairs committee.

I'd say, Madam Chair, that we should make sure all members of the committee have a copy of the Standing Orders and they could read them in their spare time.

We're talking about the use of House of Commons resources. We're all issued four devices, and they're BlackBerrys. The House of Commons resources people are very, very tight on what we can do with these devices. We're not allowed to download apps. We're not allowed to put things that we could use for our jobs on this, or any social...cooking apps and things of that nature. I like the Air Canada app. We travel a lot, and we can't even get that downloaded onto our devices.

A little while ago the House of Commons decided that Twitter and Facebook apps were going to be allowed on BlackBerrys. Interestingly enough, we've got them on all our BlackBerrys; all our staff get to use those same devices. One would be led to believe you're allowed to use Twitter and Facebook, because the House of Commons has allowed you to put them on your BlackBerrys.

We're allowed to use the House of Commons resources on our devices, so this motion is truly bizarre.

I'd like to direct our attention to another part of the motion, where we're talking about a former Liberal research employee. We're going to talk about—

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

I need to remind you that we are on your amendment rather than the original motion. You'll have an opportunity to speak to the original motion once this amendment is dealt with.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Okay. I thought my motion was the whole thing, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

We're dealing with the amendment, and the text is on the bottom of the sheet.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Fair enough. So can I come back to that when we get back to the motion?

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Yes.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Okay. Well, I will probably leave it at that for right now. I do want to come back.

Mr. Clerk, you can put me back on the speakers list, please, to speak to the motion at hand. I do have some interesting facts I'd like to talk about.

In closing, on the Twitter, and we're talking about my amendment on government resources, let's examine them. Let's look at all these government resources and House of Commons resources; it's one and the same. We should look at whether people should disclose themselves and let people know exactly who they're tweeting, in the fairness of open government and honesty and transparency, which I'm sure we'll hear some Conservative member talk about. This will be a great opportunity to talk about open government.

That's where we're at on this particular one. I just want to make sure we come back to this at some point, to finish discussing some of the other things we have.

I'll leave it at that for now, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Thank you, Mr. Andrews.

I now have Monsieur Dusseault.

[Pierre-Luc Dusseault, NDP, Sherbrooke, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I am very happy to take the floor once again today and follow up on the comments of my colleague, who added a number of interesting points to his motion in amendment. Of course, we are now talking only about the amendment in order to comply with the committee rules and make sure not to veer toward the motion we will discuss later.

I think it's very interesting that the amendment suggests tracking all the use of government resources, in particular on Twitter. I think that is a fairly broad issue that could be worth looking into.

We know that all members, all employees, with access to a BlackBerry automatically have Twitter and Facebook applications. We could perhaps even add Facebook to the motion and talk about it later. Facebook is also a social media tool that can be used in the same way as Twitter.

However, I will not get into the details of that issue today, unless we can agree to a friendly amendment that would add Facebook to Mr. Andrews' amendment, if he is okay with that. That would be a possible amendment. If the topic is social media and our BlackBerry applications as parliamentary resources, I think we could add Facebook to the amendment. That is, of course, if Mr. Andrews agrees.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Monsieur Dusseault, are you moving a subamendment?

[Pierre-Luc Dusseault, NDP, Sherbrooke, QC]

Friendly amendment.