Evidence of meeting #55 for Finance in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was enhancement.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
I'll call the meeting to order.
The first section of the meeting is to deal with committee business. The fourth report of the Subcommittee on Agenda and Procedure of the Standing Committee on Finance has been sent out to committee members. Everybody has received that report. It's fairly lengthy. I don't know if you want me to read through it or you just want to go through it section by section. I'm in your hands.
Conservative
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
You want to do section by section.
Are you okay with that, Guy?
The first section deals with the letter received by the chair from Michael McLeod, member of Parliament for the Northwest Territories, about the Honourable Robert McLeod, Premier of the Northwest Territories, requesting to meet during the week of November 21, 2016. It was agreed that the chair would write back indicating the committee's interest in hearing from him about their priorities but at a later date, perhaps during next year's pre-budget consultations.
The letter we received was mainly about pre-budget consultations for this year. Those meetings are already over. The report is being drafted—and I know it is the premier, representing a territory—so we would have to set up a special meeting to do so. We feel that if it's going to deal with budget matters, it would be better in pre-budget consultations next time around.
Ron.
Conservative
Ron Liepert Conservative Calgary Signal Hill, AB
I think our discussion was not to have just the Premier of the Northwest Territories in the pre-budget invitation for next year but to have the premiers of the three territorial governments, so I would like to see that in the letter versus what you verbally said.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
That's fine.
Is there any other discussion?
Robert, I know you had some concerns that we weren't meeting.
Go ahead, and then it will be Dan.
Liberal
Robert-Falcon Ouellette Liberal Winnipeg Centre, MB
Thank you very much, Chair.
Personally, I'm in favour of having the Premier of the Northwest Territories. He's an indigenous leader. He's an indigenous person. I don't think we've heard enough from indigenous leaders in our consultations. I also think we haven't heard enough from the north.
Did the committee go up north?
Liberal
Robert-Falcon Ouellette Liberal Winnipeg Centre, MB
We did not go up north, and I think while he's not a representative of the Yukon or Nunavut, at the same time he still represents a very important one third of our northern country.
We often use the expression “coast to coast to...coast”—I put the pause in there for the blues—but it's important to recognize, I think, that perhaps there is still more we could be doing.
To me, waiting another year is too long, because if we wait until the fall of next year, essentially that's another 10 months. Whether we have a special meeting to hear from the Premier of the Northwest Territories about the issues facing the Northwest Territories, to have on the record some special consideration of what's going on up north, with issues not only of suicide but also of transportation and energy, I think we could find an hour for this gentleman.
If we can find an hour for the chair of the Economic Council of Canada to testify from South Korea, I'm sure if the premier is willing to come here to Ottawa in the week of November 21, we could at least hear him out, ask a few questions, and gain a better understanding of one of the only territories in the country where the federal government has a direct responsibility for almost all of the services.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
I think probably procedurally the best way to proceed is we need basically an agreement to adopt the subcommittee report, and if there's anything we want to pull out of it and deal with differently we can do that. Perhaps I could finish quickly going through the report and then come back to those sections that people want to deal with separately.
The second section really deals with the procedure and how we would deal with Bill C-26, which is the amendments to the Canada Pension Plan, the schedule that we would set up. It's listed on the paper.
The third section lays out, on a motion from Steven MacKinnon, the procedure that would be followed relative to votes on Bill C-26.
The fourth section lays out the plan of the committee to deal with Bill C-29, a second act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 22, 2016, and other measures. That procedure on timing is laid out there.
The fifth section in the subcommittee report points out that we agreed to a motion by Steven MacKinnon that lays out how we would consider Bill C-29 and when the votes would have to take place.
The sixth section is laying out that in relation to the pre-budget consultations on the 2017 budget, if we can find the time, the committee would convene an in camera post-mortem meeting before the holiday break to discuss this year's progress and how we could do it differently.
The seventh section of the subcommittee report talks about how we would deal with Bill C-240, an act to amend the Income Tax Act (tax credit—first aid), which was referred to the committee on October 26, 2016, and that the committee consider this bill at the end of January or in February 2017, as the bill must be reported back to the House for March 23, 2017.
That's the subcommittee report. Have we got agreement on that?
You want to come back and deal with the first section, I gather? Okay.
Dan.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
I'll wait until we deal with the first section, Mr. Chair.
NDP
Guy Caron NDP Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC
Mr. Chair, Further to the comment that was made, I am most amenable to meeting with the premiers of the three territories. A meeting with them is long-overdue. To my mind, it makes no sense to meet right away with just one premier. I think we should hear about issues affecting the north from all of the region's representatives. I would be in favour of a motion to meet with them at the end of this sitting, either before the holidays or immediately afterwards. I think it's a good idea. Not to say it would be an insult, but waiting too long to hear from them probably wouldn't be the proper thing to do.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that the Premier of the Northwest Territories is coming to Ottawa to meet with a number of committees, not just the Standing Committee on Finance. I think he is going to meet with the Standing Committee on Natural Resources, probably the Standing Committee on Indigenous and Northern Affairs, and so on. He's going to have an opportunity to speak with many people while he's here.
If the committee wishes to meet with the three premiers, I am very amenable to doing so.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Okay. So then the question is, when?
At any rate, we'll draft that letter along the lines.... I had forgotten about the three premiers, my apologies. We'll draft that letter along those lines.
Is it acceptable to you that we go that way, that we draft this and try to meet the three together as soon as possible, given our agenda? It would have to be a separate study from the pre-budget consultations. Okay? All right.
Dan, you had a point.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Originally I was going to add some comment to the discussion around section one. I thought we were going to come back to it later. I was just going to say we could do that later.
Would you prefer that I make my short comment now?
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
I appreciate a letter. I think an invitation should go out. Again, I think it's important that people are heard, and particularly since the premier has made the request we should try to honour that if we can. The timeline may not work for the pre-budget consultation report, but certainly the government can listen and take any testimony from those conversations into consideration.
Conservative
Ron Liepert Conservative Calgary Signal Hill, AB
One other thing we have to consider is that we have just had an election in the Yukon. We have a new leader in the Yukon, which might make it difficult to do before Christmas. I would suggest we take that into account as well.
Liberal
Liberal
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
There's one other thing. We have the calendar, which people have, I believe. The calendar is laid out on the basis of the subcommittee report. It's there before you.
Are there any questions on that? Is there anything people may want to change?
Ms. O'Connell.
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
Thanks, Mr. Chair.
My only question is in regard to whether, when we're considering the draft PBC, we have a timeline. I know the Library of Parliament's working very hard on this. Do we have a timeline for the report, as well as the blues? It's just so that I can schedule within my own office anything we want to highlight.
June Dewetering Committee Researcher
We are working diligently with the people who format the report and with the translation unit to try to get it into your hands by the end of business on Friday, November 25.
