Fisheries Committee on Feb. 27th, 2020

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Do we want to go beyond March 31?

Mr. Calkins.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Chair, I think you have a very good sense of what the priorities of the committees are. Given the fact that, as you get responses from witnesses, as long as this committee believes in good faith that you're pursuing witnesses in accordance with the priorities of the committee, I would like to assure you that if something that we're scheduling cannot go directly as planned, you have my support in scheduling whoever you deem necessary to make sure that we don't waste any of the committee's time and that we have witnesses coming in to at least address one of the studies, based on the priorities you have picked up clearly from this committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

I appreciate that, sir.

Mr. Arnold.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

I believe the supplementary estimates are also out. We would be requesting a meeting with the minister and officials on the supplementary estimates before they have to be signed off on. That may juggle the schedule around as well.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

The only thing is—and I realize the minister has responded to the first invitation—I don't think there's much time. If the minister was available earlier, she probably would have come earlier than the 26th, so we're probably not going to get the minister in between this. It's going to be sometime after March 31, I would think, but we can send another invitation, as requested, and see where it lands and what kind of a response we get.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Do we have a deadline for when the estimates have to be approved by the committee?

[The Clerk]

The deadline is floating because, as it is written, it is three days before the last date of the supply period, which is the 26th. Three days before that would be the deadline to report or three days before the last supply day, which at this time we don't know. So this date is unclear. That does not prevent the committee from inviting the minister in question on the supplementary estimates. It's just that the committee would not be able to report officially to the House, but the subject matter of the supplementary estimates can be studied anyway.

That being said, I believe the main estimates are also coming very soon.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Mr. Arnold.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

I would request that the chair also send the request to the minister for her and her officials to appear on the supplementary estimates or the main estimates if that happens to be the case, whichever happens to fit into those deadlines.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

All right, understood. It will be done.

Mr. Calkins.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Just for the record, Mr. Chair, these are predictable, scheduled things. This happens every year. While the dates might be somewhat flexible due to the parliamentary process, it should come as no surprise to this committee or to the minister that a request to appear to discuss the supplementary estimates or the main estimates ought to be expected. My hope is that the meeting that we already have the minister confirmed for isn't to discuss the main estimates or the supplementary estimates, but to discuss the issues for which she was invited to the committee and that we would have a further opportunity to discuss the estimates with the minister prior to the date that we need to, whatever it happens to be.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

We'll do our best. We'll send the invitation as soon as possible and hopefully get a response very quickly.

So again, do we go beyond the 31st? We haven't got to it because Mr. Calkins put faith in me to know the priorities and determine what days we're going to do what. Thank you for that again. I just wanted to mention that again and get it on the record.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

We go to break week after April 2nd for two weeks. If we can get herring wrapped up on the 2nd, then at least we have drafters working on that report so we can get it in to the government and get the response that we need. If we can shoot for that target, then we go to break week for two weeks and start salmon following Easter.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

So we'll leave the 2nd open for now as we go forward and use it as I see fit.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

I just want to be clear, Mr. Chair, that my faith in you to adapt the schedule only extends to the season ending March 31. After that, we will have a new season, in which case we will have new regulations and requirements for you to follow.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Mr. Arnold.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Before we close, I would like the clerk to read what we have once more so our staff is very clear on deadlines for witnesses and what is drafted so far.

Beyond that, I'd like a little clarity from Mr. Hardie, if we could. Do we expect to have his salmon study completed before the end of the spring session? I realize it won't be the end of our study on salmon, because we have a lot more specific, targeted studies on specific issues after that point, but was it Mr. Hardie's intention to have that wrapped up so it could be submitted to government and expect a response before we come back in the fall?

[The Clerk]

I will present, as requested by Mr. Arnold, the update on the calendar. Because we have changed the calendar, at the end we may want to discuss again the deadlines or witnesses, because they have all changed.

On March 10, we have officials for Big Bar. On March 12, we have officials for herring studies. Then there's a break week. On the 24th, we have witnesses on Mr. Battiste's study on herring. On the 26th, we have confirmation that the minister will appear on Big Bar. On the 31st, we changed and now we agree that the witnesses on Big Bar will appear, and I assume the drafting instructions would be at the end of that meeting.

Then we also agreed that we would look at a time for potential witnesses for a study from Ms. Gill.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Just for clarification, earlier we talked about the 13th for salmon, but why don't we leave salmon—for witnesses—until early April, since we're not going to study salmon until after Easter?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

We don't have anything scheduled in there for witnesses for salmon.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

We have the 13th for the salmon.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Yes, it went off on another path right after that.

[The Clerk]

Do you want to keep that, or do you want to change it?