Foreign Affairs Committee on Nov. 20th, 2007

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

It is printed on the second page. This then becomes a friendly amendment to Mr. Dewar's motion. She wrote it out so we would be able to see it.

It doesn't change substantively what Mr. Dewar's motion did, although it does add timelines, and it does say that we can bring in the testimony from the summer, from last spring. It also says “making sure to assess, among other aspects, CIDA's participation in Afghanistan and also making sure to investigate possible approaches to establishing a lasting peace in Afghanistan, and, in order to make recommendations...”.

In my opinion, it does not change the motion substantively enough to be ruled out of order, so I do believe that this motion is in order. Here you have the friendly amendment to Mr. Dewar's motion, and we would then see Mr. Wilfert's and Mr. Martin's motions struck.

Is that clearly represented, Mr. Martin?

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

This is a very big issue that we all know, and I think all of us feel passionate about dealing with this.

Because of the substantive nature of the motion and the issue at hand, I would recommend that we push the timeline out, only because I don't think we'll be able to do justice to it, given the other issues we'll be dealing with prior to that time. We have only four weeks--six meetings--until the break.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Not even, because some of them will be in --

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Right, so we have one taken off for the Chateau Laurier meeting, one taken out because of the Foodgrains Bank. At maximum, we would have four meetings in total.

I think that this is just such a substantive issue and because all of the parties here--the Bloc, the NDP, and the Liberal Party--have put forth essentially the same motion to do the same thing, there's a lot of cross-party interest and also public interest in this issue that can provide substantive direction to the government on how to ensure that our mission in Afghanistan is going to be improved.

I would just recommend, Madame Barbot, if you have agreement with Mr. Dewar, that we push this timeline out. I know we want to get an effective series of solutions, and quickly, but maybe we need to push this out to the end of February.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Madame Barbot. No?

Mr. Goldring, did you want to speak on that?

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

In addition to the timeline, which I think would be very tight to do, given the many other issues we have here to meet with and discuss, it's my belief that in Afghanistan, Canada is doing its best to examine the issues that are happening there. It has brought in a completely independent committee to do that examination too. It would be premature, I believe, to have the government respond before the secondary committee is brought in too. We have the report from the secondary committee. In addition, I believe this is coming before Parliament too.

You correctly identified the tightness of the agenda going in from here. I believe this really doesn't materially change it from what we had the discussions on before. In light of that, I believe that it precludes what results and what reporting may be coming from this independent committee. It would be better to hold this and proceed with the other orders of business that we have, so we don't cut those short.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Goldring.

There is just one other point on that before Madame Barbot speaks. Of course passing the motion with the current date on there would probably mean that we would never be able to ask the Manley commission to come forward and explain their report. We could after the fact, but not in conjunction with this report.

Madame Barbot.

[Vivian Barbot, Bloc, Papineau, QC]

Precisely, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Goldring spoke about the fact that an independent commission is going to study the issue. We feel that parliamentarians are primarily responsible for giving an opinion to the government. In that regard, we feel it is important, given that we have already worked on the Afghanistan file, that this work at least be the subject of a preliminary report. That is what I said to Mr. Martin. This preliminary report would not prevent us from continuing to study the Afghanistan issue. In any case, we feel that for the moment, it is important to let it be known that the committee has done work on this, and to communicate the results.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Mr. Wilfert.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Chairman, one way we could get around this is to use the 14th for an interim report. That way we would keep to the timeline but we would have an interim report available. The Manley commission is reporting sometime at the end of January. One of the issues I raised at the steering committee is that if we are going to have other items on this agenda that would take time away, it's not as doable as we may all like. It may be that if we concentrate and do an interim report for the 14th, at least we'll have something to deal with. I'm not in favour of dropping the 14th. It might be more doable though as an interim. At least we'll have something out there that we're aiming for.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Wilfert.

Mr. Martin.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

I understand what Mr. Goldring is saying, but we know that this is the pre-eminent foreign policy challenge for your government and also for our country right now. It's clearly our duty as the foreign affairs committee to be able to deal with this.

This isn't going to be in lieu of the report done by Mr. Manley and company, but it would be a wonderful addition to it. We all know this wouldn't be the first time that various groups within Parliament are actually dealing with the same thing at the same time. If we have the interim report, as Mr. Wilfert suggested, which I think is a good idea, in the middle of December, but continue, we'll be able to look at the report by Mr. Manley when we come back and hear other groups that are important.

We also know that there's no way on God's green earth that we can actually do justice to this issue even by the end of February. However, by the end of February we can incorporate the work of Mr. Manley and his team. We can also provide some other groups to listen to in February, and we can really come out with a substantive series of solutions that will deal with the ever-changing nature, not only within Afghanistan, but also particularly within Pakistan, which is having huge implications within the country. That's not being dealt with, nor are the other regional implications outside of the country.

We can really do justice to this by looking at those players outside of Afghanistan that are having a huge play within the country and mitigating what's going on there.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Martin.

Mr. Dewar and then Mr. Obhrai.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I'm going to echo some of the comments made.

The understanding at committee, I believe--correct me if I'm wrong on this, Chair--was that we were talking about having a preliminary report. So it was just an omission in the text. That's a common sense thing to do.

I'd like to add that if we are able to have that interim report, what we're doing is actually adding to and contributing towards this special panel, which I think Canadians want to see. I have to be clear on our party's stand on this. We believe Parliament should be handling this issue. The government has gone ahead and it has decided to do an extra-parliamentary panel. That's fine. That's their choice and they've done it.

Our role and our responsibility and what we're paid to do is to examine issues of significance in foreign affairs. As was mentioned by Mr. Martin, this is it, the issue of Afghanistan.

Having that change, preliminary report or interim report--choose your word--will meet that mark. It will contribute towards what the panel is doing, and I think that's our role. Hopefully there will be some reciprocity in that process. In other words, if we're able, at some date, to incorporate what they've said and what we've heard from them, all the better. I think it's really important that we do have the interim report in December to contribute towards the panel. I think that can be changed by just changing the one word in the motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

All right. Thank you, Mr. Dewar.

Mr. Obhrai.

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Listening to all these things, we have a problem--I think it's been outlined--which is the December 14 date, even for a preliminary report. You know, Mr. Chair, when the reports are made, whether they're preliminary or not, we have very diverse opinions among the parties, so you could have a situation of one not agreeing with the other, and there could be minority report issues, and all these things. It does become a bigger and bigger picture.

At the same time, although there is a government panel out there--the Manley panel is doing this thing that we all want to listen to--we still have other issues, as Gerry pointed out, about the NGOs coming and talking in front of us, about the conference that we're going to attend, and all these things.

I'm not saying that the report is not needed, and parliamentarians don't have the ability and the right to carry on, but if you want to make this thing.... This is cutting it short. This is like running just to meet an artificial deadline without doing proper work. There is the issue of Pakistan, as well as all the other issues, so I agree we need to do a comprehensive report. Technically, I think looking for a preliminary report is running without doing a proper job, so it will be very difficult for us to support.

I'm not talking only about the Manley panel; I'm also talking about others. And, most importantly, it is important that we bring in the NGOs, who have now come out with a collective voice, and listen and do proper justice to the report, if you want to. Ultimately, it's an important issue that the foreign affairs committee will examine. The foreign affairs committee's credibility will come into question, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Obhrai, for those points.

I think the last thing that any of us would want to see is a report that isn't clearly reflective of what we've seen, a report that's filed because of an artificial deadline and that really has no substance to it. So, for that, I applaud those for allowing us the opportunity to include all the testimony that has been heard prior to the summer break.

That does create some difficulties, perhaps, for some of the new members. We have a number of new members on the committee who are then asked to sign on to a lot of witnesses on different sides of the report. Those will be reflected in this report. So if you're including that much, we're in a very tight timeline.

I understand what you're saying. In some measure, it's accountability that we're asking for with that date. We don't just want to study forever and never bring in a report, but I'll tell you, it would have to be a balanced report. I'm one who thinks that the more we can work together.... We can have three pages of a preliminary report from the committee. We can have eight pages from this group, six pages from the next party, five pages from over here, and it's a shemozzle. Is it workable? I guess that's what we're here to find out.

Is there anyone else?

Madame Barbot, and then Mr. Goldring.

[Vivian Barbot, Bloc, Papineau, QC]

In answer to your question, I think it is entirely doable, given the work that has already been accomplished. We could meet the deadline with no difficulty. We must not forget that we have an entire session of work behind us, and that even for us, it would be good to continue. It would be very useful to take stock of the situation, to see where we are at and to determine the direction we should take in future business.

Pursuant to what has been said, I will table an amendment that adds the following words to the end of the motion:

[...] to table a preliminary report in the House of Commons no later than December 14, 2007.

I think the date is quite appropriate, given that the bulk of the work has already been done.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Mr. Goldring.

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

Looking at the timeline here, I think it's important to look at this peacebuilding in Afghanistan on December 11. While I can certainly understand why we would want to put forward a report, to suggest that we could wrap this issue up into a report that has full meaning to it, when we're still discussing with the NGOs on December 11--and do this by December 14--is being a little bit over-optimistic. I would suggest that this time of December 14 for wrapping up the report is just too problematic. How can we have a meaningful report by that date, with the consultations that we have from now until then? And then considering that we will not have had the benefit of talking to or interviewing or having committee meetings with the independent panel that is looking after it, I would suggest that December 14 is very problematic.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Again, I would remind you that this is a preliminary report. It's not a conclusive report. It's not the final report. We may still have more witnesses after Christmas. The study may continue. This would be a bit of a picture as to what we have received. It may not include any of the testimony we hear on the 11th. It would in that we have Rubin coming--well, we've already heard him. Some of those people would be reflected in the report, but it doesn't mean that we have to have a report in which the witnesses on the 12th or 11th have to be in it.

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

I would say that it's precluding having a meaningful report by trying to push a date that is so close to some meetings with the groups--the NGOs. I really don't see how we can support this position. How meaningful can that report be in light of the other things that we have to do? How much more meaningful will the report be if we're able to proceed through in discussing with the other parties who are doing a more in-depth study on it?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Goldring.

Mr. Chan, Mr. Martin, Mr. Obhrai.

[Raymond Chan, Liberal, Richmond, BC]

I would think that the interim report is very important in order to summarize all the work that this committee has done, in the last session as well, as a contribution to the members of the panel. I don't know if there's any other process that is in the plan for this committee to contribute to the panel. This interim report would be a perfect way to make sure that the panel is taking into consideration inputs from the public. This committee is formed by elected officials representing the people of Canada. If our voice is not being heard by the panel, I think that would defeat the purpose of that panel. That's why I think this interim report is a very important contribution to the whole debate in the country.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Chan.

Mr. Martin and then Mr. Obhrai.

Sorry, Madame St-Hilaire, we missed you. I thought you were just waving at me earlier. Go ahead.