Fisheries Committee on Feb. 3rd, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Is there anything further?

Mr. Blais.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

I agree with Lawrence. It does happen that I agree with him from time to time.

This is how I understand the notice of motion. When we're discussing an issue, for example small craft harbours, another subject could be of interest to one of the members of the committee. If that occurs, the motion, or the notice of motion can be tabled. With respect to an amendment or a subamendment regarding a given discussion, anything is possible because the topic is already being discussed. For example, if we are dealing with the seal hunt, small craft harbours, the catastrophe facing ground fish fishers, or anything else, there is nothing preventing us from tabling a notice of motion. In my opinion, a notice of motion prevents us from talking about any other subject that does not tie in to the subject being discussed then and there. However, there is nothing preventing us from tabling a notice of motion on a particular subject that could be discussed at a future meeting.

I am more in favour of maintaining the status quo, because I believe that it accommodates our committee. I do, however, want to point out to Randy that the current format allows for a certain level of flexibility on holding discussions. This format is effective because a member cannot table a motion on any given subject when we are discussing a specific topic.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Monsieur Lévesque.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Correct me if I am wrong, but according to what Randy is saying, if we withdraw the words “for any substantive motion to be considered by the Committee, unless the substantive motion relates directly to business then under consideration”, we can use the substantive motion only if we want to raise another topic that is not currently being discussed then and there, or we deal with the motion. Urgent situations can occur during which we need to table a motion being discussed.

My understanding is that if we're taking this out, a member can table a motion on a subject being discussed with 48 hours' notice. Right now, if the matter relates to the subject being discussed, a 48-hour notice is not required to introduce an amendment or motion. Just correct me if I have misinterpreted. If we amend the motion as Randy suggests, we run the risk of extending the timeframe in which decisions are made.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

The amendment is to delete the wording, “unless a substantive motion relates directly to business then under consideration”. So you're correct when you assume that what's being proposed would limit any motions to 48 hours' notice.

Does that clarify it for you, Monsieur Lévesque?

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Mr. Kamp.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

I guess I would just say that if we do proceed with the status quo, then we would certainly expect all honourable members of this committee to act honourably and not blindside, because the wording of this says “business then under consideration”. It doesn't say it was ever on an agenda. It just says it was under consideration. It got on the floor in some way. There's a whole variety of means that could then lead to a legal substantive motion. That's what would concern us, of course. If the business under consideration were planned business, if it said “to planned business then under consideration”, I would feel more comfortable with that.

In either case, however we proceed with this, we expect everyone to act respectfully. I think that has happened in the past. It's hard to define what a substantive motion is, and it's also hard to define what “under consideration” means, how it got on the floor at the time.

Those are our concerns, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Is there any further discussion before we vote on the amendment?

Mr. Kamp's amendment would be to remove the wording “unless the substantive motion relates directly to business then under consideration”.

(Amendment negatived)

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Now we need to go back and vote on the motion as stands by the 39th Parliament: that 48 hours' notice be required for any substantive motion to be considered by the committee, unless the substantive motion relates directly to business then under consideration; and that the notice of motion be filed with the clerk of the committee and distributed to members in both official languages.

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

I so move.

(Amendment agreed to)

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

On the next motion on allocation of time for questioning, the 39th Parliament motion read:

That witnesses from an organization be given ten (10) minutes to make their opening statement; and that, at the discretion of the chair, during the questioning of witnesses, there be allocated ten (10) minutes for the first questioner of the Liberal Party, seven (7) minutes for the first questioner of the Bloc Quebecois, five (5) minutes to the questioner of the New Democratic Party, and ten (10) minutes for the first questioner of the Conservative Party; and that if there is a subsequent round that the rotation be the same except all questioning be for five (5) minutes.

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

I so move.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Is there any discussion?

Mr. Stoffer.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

I just find that when somebody travels from across the country to speak to our committee--for those who don't have their BlackBerrys out and who actually listen--ten minutes is not enough. I'd like to give them 15 minutes to be able to present their case. Some folks are quite nervous, or it may not be in the right language for them or whatever. I'd like to see them get at least 15 minutes to be able to make their point.

Secondly, I notice that the time allotted for questions hasn't changed in terms of ten, seven, and five. I would move, respectfully, that seeing how the official opposition dropped from 100 down to 70-some seats and they still keep their ten minutes, which I don't want to change, I would like to see the New Democratic Party--be it me, Jack, or whoever is here in this position--have seven minutes.

So I would make just two slight changes, that the ten-minute presentation by witnesses goes to 15, and that the NDP position is seven minutes. Everything else remains more or less the same.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Mr. Stoffer would make an amendment to change the time allotted for presenters to 15 minutes, and the time allotted for the New Democratic Party to seven minutes.

Is that correct, Mr. Stoffer? Thank you.

Mr. Allen.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In the spirit of collaboration.... It's funny how this comes up for discussion every time but ends up reverting back to the way it was.

From my past experience on the committee, in a lot of cases when witnesses come in they will each take an hour, typically. So getting through this is sometimes a challenge, and getting all members to be able to actively participate also ends up being a challenge. You have to do all these gymnastics around splitting time. And I'm okay with doing some of that as well.

What I'd like to do is this. I'm not necessarily averse to Mr. Stoffer's proposal, to his increase in minutes to properly reflect the representation in the House. That's fine. But I think when it comes to the second rounds, I would like to see an opportunity before we go to each party a second time.... If that means we have to adjust the time accordingly, we can, but for future rounds I would like to see us make sure that all members have had a chance to question the witness prior to our going to a second round for some. I would like to see a situation whereby we continue that first round as we do, and then we would go to the Liberals, the Conservatives, then the Bloc, then the Conservatives. Then we might end up with a couple of Conservative questioners in a row, and then we could go back to the full rotation if we had a round of time after that.

So my amendment is that if there is a subsequent round, the rotation alternate between opposition and government members until all members have had the opportunity to question the witnesses, and all questioning will be for a period of five minutes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

So you would like to propose a subamendment to Mr. Stoffer's amendment, that in the subsequent round it would rotate between opposition and government until all members have had an opportunity to question.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Yes. Now, practically that might not...because with one hour, it's probably not going to happen very often anyway. If it's one hour and one hour, we'd go back to the round anyway, so....

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Mr. MacAulay.

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

The problem I see with any of the changes is that we sat here before and put all this formula together. We found previously that when the presenters came in, they had 10 minutes, which can run 12 or 13 minutes, which means you have, in a one-hour presentation, about one-quarter of the time used by the presenter. It cuts in on the time.

My thought would be that if you shift to 15 minutes, that would be great, but you only have an hour, and there's lots of dialogue between the different parties and the presenter. I would like to leave it the way it is. We fought hard to get this into a reasonably acceptable mode. We find that if the presenters go on too long, you just don't get time enough to ask questions.

The way it's set up seems to have worked pretty well. Perhaps somebody wants a minute or two more or something like that, but I think overall the chair has been reasonably generous over the period. I expect that this chair could be too. But if we get into shifting this back and forth.... I think it was a lot of work putting it the way it is, it has worked reasonably well, and I would support that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Mr. Calkins.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Given the fact that the committee is composed of members of Parliament, and that as elected officials, public office-holders, it is our responsibility to carry out our business here at this committee.... This is what this is about.

I'm not necessarily averse...and I understand the rationale that Mr. Stoffer put forward for having 15 minutes, but in reality, is 10 minutes with a subsequent 50 minutes of questions and answers less valuable than 15 minutes followed by 45 minutes of questions and answers? Given the fact that our role as parliamentarians is to be here to defend the interests of our constituents and to bring forward issues pertaining to our constituency, if we did that, it would provide less opportunity for us to do our work as parliamentarians, although it would provide more opportunity for the presenters.

So I'm still a little conflicted on that. I think that my time as a member of Parliament here may be less respected in that particular case, so I have a little bit of an issue with that. I'd like to see it stay at 10 minutes.

What I do recall from the last session of Parliament is that as a member of this committee, there were several times when I had questions and I had no opportunity in a one-hour session to bring my question or concern forward to the witnesses. That is because of the current structure of the speaking order and rounds of questioning. Now, I'm just as elected to this House of Commons as every other member of this committee, and I take great umbrage...as a matter of fact, I would almost take it to the point of a question of privilege. If we don't change the speaking order to reflect an opportunity for every member of this committee to have an opportunity to question a witness, when other members have three opportunities or two opportunities to question a witness, I think it will impact on my ability to operate on this committee as a member of Parliament. And I do believe it would pose a legitimate question of privilege, my parliamentary privilege as a member of this committee to fulfill my obligations and my duties to this committee, and we need to be very careful about that.

So we can talk about minutes if we want to work out something that is reflective and works for everybody. But I do think we seriously need to take a look at this, because every member of this committee is equal--or should be equal or have equal opportunity to ask questions of a witness.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Mr. Bagnell.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

I wanted to ask Mr. Stoffer a question about his amendment on the number of minutes.

Usually when I've been at committee meetings, there's not been just one organization; there's very often been a panel. So if you have a panel of two or three organizations--and sometimes if it's a two-hour session we have four or five organizations--does that mean each of those organizations, if you have five organizations...? That would be an hour and 15 minutes out of two hours used on just the witnesses.

Can he clarify what's he's proposing?