Finance Committee on Dec. 13th, 2021

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

It's 6:30. I call this meeting to order.

Welcome, everyone, to meeting number nine of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance.

Pursuant to the House of Commons order of reference adopted on December 2, 2021, the committee is meeting on Bill C-2, an act to provide further support in response to COVID-19.

I know I've gone over a number of the health and safety measures with all of the members, as well as with the witnesses who are with us today. They are ministry officials who understand the different protocols we have to abide by—the two-metre physical distancing, the wearing of masks and the hygiene.

Also, when it comes to using our technical system here for the hybrid—

[Terry Beech, Liberal, Burnaby North—Seymour, BC]

On a point of order, Chair, the bells are now ringing, so we're probably going to need a consent motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Yes, the bells have started ringing, so we're looking for unanimous consent to continue straight through until about five to seven minutes before the vote, and then we will suspend at that time.

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you.

On these hybrid sessions, as we have Mr. Beech out on the west coast, there's the opportunity to use the interpretation at the bottom of your screen for English or French. I believe the members understand everything else.

Now I'd like to welcome the witnesses we have before us.

From the Department of Employment and Social Development, we have Elisha Ram, Catherine Demers, Douglas Wolfe, Benoit Cadieux, George Rae and Sébastien St-Arnaud.

From the Department of Finance, we have Max Baylor, Lindsay Gwyer, Trevor McGowan and Yves Poirier with us today.

We'll now proceed with clause-by-clause consideration.

Pursuant to Standing Order 75(1), consideration of the title is postponed.

New clause 0.1 brings us to amendment NDP-1, which is on page one of the package.

On NDP-1, I look to Mr. Blaikie.

Do you have some comments on this?

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I don't think it's a secret to anybody on the committee the extent to which a number of seniors across the country have been suffering as a result of having their guaranteed income supplement benefits clawed back. These are seniors who worked prior to the pandemic. They were eligible for CERB according to the rules. They were encouraged to apply. They weren't told that it would be clawed back later through the GIS.

This very committee heard the story of a woman, for instance, who is living in her car in the Northwest Territories at the outset of winter because she can't make rent. We have a colleague, Alistair MacGregor, who had a man contact him recently because he had just been diagnosed with cancer. He has an eviction pending on December 23 and he can't afford his medications.

The frustrating part of this all along, of course, has been that had the government chosen simply not to count that income in the eligibility calculation for the GIS, this would have been avoided. We know that the government knew about this issue as early as May 2021, which was plenty of time to fix it before it took effect, and now we're at months after it took effect and people are in crisis.

This amendment is one of the amendments required in order not to make the pandemic benefit income non-taxable—we were very clear in our direction to the drafters that the benefit income would remain taxable income—but to remove that income from the eligibility calculation of the guaranteed income supplement.

That's the purpose of this amendment. We've been reassured by the drafters that it does this without jeopardizing the taxable status of that income. I am moving this amendment because it would help ensure that this gets cleared up and that it gets cleared up in legislation.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, Mr. Blaikie.

Is there any further discussion?

I'll now give my ruling on this amendment. It is inadmissible, and here's my reason for that.

Bill C-2 provides for further support in response to COVID-19. The amendment seeks to amend subparagraph 56(1)(r)(iv.1) of the Income Tax Act to remove any COVID-related financial assistance amount from the calculation of the taxpayer's income in order to receive an old age security benefit.

As House of Commons Procedure and Practice, third edition, states on page 770, “An amendment to a bill that was referred to a committee after second reading is out of order. It is beyond the scope and principle of the bill.” In the opinion of the chair, the amendment is a new concept that is beyond the scope of the bill, and it would also require royal recommendation.

Therefore, I rule the amendment inadmissible. This ruling also applies to NDP-2, since the two amendments are consequential.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Yes, Mr. Blaikie.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

I would respectfully challenge your ruling.

I think one of the things to understand is that this bill does provide for pandemic benefits of a type, inadequate as they may be, and this amendment is also about ensuring that those future benefits, if paid out to seniors in a like situation—say, under the Canada worker lockdown benefit—are not included in the calculation for their guaranteed income supplement next year.

The topic of the bill, as has been the case for the entire proceeding since it began, has been pandemic benefits. This amendment, while it does apply to previous pandemic amendments.... I was just up defending the idea that this bill should be kept together after all, because there is an important overarching theme of the bill in terms of how we restart our recovery, but this amendment does actually apply to the benefits listed in the bill as well. I think it's not quite fair to say that it's out of scope or that it doesn't legitimately touch on the issues already raised within the bill.

It is for that reason that I would contest your ruling, Mr. Chair, and ask that the committee have the opportunity to have a recorded division, if and when there's no further discussion on this, in order to test the will of the committee in respect to your ruling.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, Mr. Blaikie.

Is there any further discussion?

Ms. Dzerowicz, go ahead.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Could I just ask a question, Mr. Chair?

If you have deemed it inadmissible, and if by chance this committee votes in favour of this motion moving ahead with the bill—whether it's through you or through the clerk, and maybe we could ask the clerk—what happens when it gets to the floor? Is it something where the Speaker just automatically says, “Well, it was inadmissible, so it's not going to be considered part of the bill”?

Maybe, through you, I could ask the clerk if he could respond to that question.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

We have clerks. I don't know if it's....

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Oh, I'm sorry. It's for whoever can answer that question.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Philippe will be helping us with that answer.

Go ahead, Philippe.

[Philippe Méla, Legislative Clerk]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

To your question, if an amendment is ruled inadmissible in committee, a challenge is put forward and the amendment eventually is adopted, somebody could raise a point of order in the chamber to alert the Speaker that there is an inadmissible amendment in the report. If the Speaker decides that the amendment is indeed inadmissible, he could take the amendment out of the report and ask for a new reprint of the bill, and the amendment would be taken out of the bill.

In this instance, there are two parameters that come into play. There is the “out of scope”, but there's also the need for royal recommendation, so those are two different aspects of things. On the royal recommendation, the Speaker could do it of his own volition, without a point of order.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you. I appreciate that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you.

On the speakers list, I have Monsieur Ste-Marie, and then Mr. Chambers.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have a follow‑up question for Mr. Méla.

If the situation you just described were to occur, in other words, if the committee's report were to be presented to the Speaker of the House, the Speaker were to make a ruling and the bill had to be reprinted, could this be resolved in one hour or two, or would it delay the process by a few days? My concern is that we are sitting until Friday of this week, and my party and I want the bill to be passed by then.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Go ahead, please, Philippe.

[Philippe Méla]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for your question, Mr. Ste‑Marie.

It's a good question, but I can't really answer it. It really depends on the workload of the Clerk of the House, and also on the workload of the Speaker of the House, who may have to deal with other points of order or other questions of privilege.

It is difficult for me to tell you how long it would take if the report were presented to the House tomorrow, for example. It could take one day or it could take until Wednesday. It really varies, so I can't answer that question with absolute certainty.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

I have Mr. Chambers.

[Adam Chambers, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

We heard testimony from a number of government officials and, in particular, the Minister of Finance, noting that they are well aware of this issue. I think the amendment by Mr. Blaikie is quite reasonable and addresses a well-known issue that we could fix here this evening. Unless, of course, there is someone on the government side who is suggesting that there's another bill coming up tomorrow that will deal with this issue, I think it's reasonable to consider this amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

I think we take this to the clerk for a vote on the challenge to the chair's ruling.