Evidence of meeting #59 for Foreign Affairs and International Development in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was amendment.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ali Ehsassi
Call the vote, please, Madam Clerk.
(Motion agreed to: yeas 5; nays 1)
The meeting is adjourned.
Liberal
Rob Oliphant Liberal Don Valley West, ON
Mr. Chair, could I now move a motion that is not related to that clause, but simply move that we can...?
I want advice from the legislative clerk on this. Can I do up to 30 days, or do I do 30 days? Does it have to be a definitive period of time for an extension, or can it be up to 30 days?
Liberal
Rob Oliphant Liberal Don Valley West, ON
It's 30 days.
I move that we request of the House of Commons an extension of 30 days for consideration of this bill.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ali Ehsassi
Is there unanimous consent?
No, there isn't.
You want us to put it to a vote.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
No, it's debatable. We are now in debate on Mr. Oliphant's motion. Okay.
I would like to propose to amend the motion from 30 days to 10 days, and I'll explain why.
I think we should get this bill done. The process is that we have 60 days to look at private members' bills, and it will be 60 days on Wednesday. For most of that time, we didn't deal with this bill. My view is that this committee should prioritize legislation, and we could have had much more time to get through all of this back-and-forth.
Unfortunately, this committee has chosen to put consideration of this bill to the very end of that timeline. The effect of that choice is that we are in an extreme rush now.
To be reasonable, I want to try to work with members and have some time for an extension, but to wait another 30 days, or up to 30 days, puts us in a position of delaying this important legislation. We're in a minority Parliament. Nobody knows what's going to happen. I don't want to create a situation in which the bill does not pass because of delays. I think 10 days gives us enough time to have the conversations, but I think we want to have the ticking clock here to make sure that it actually gets done.
We want to get this bill done, and a 10-day extension is enough, but not too much. I want to see the amendment pass.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ali Ehsassi
Mr. Genuis, I'm afraid I have to advise you that we can only go with 30 days. It's up to 30 days, of course, but you do not have the option of varying that—
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Ten days is up to 30 days.
What does the Standing Order say, Madam Clerk?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ali Ehsassi
Is it Standing Order 97.1?
If you're referring to Standing Order 97.1, it reads:
A standing, special or legislative committee to which a private member’s public bill has been referred shall in every case, within 60 sitting days from the date of the bill’s reference to the committee, either report the bill to the House with or without amendment or present to the House a report containing a recommendation not to proceed further with the bill and giving the reasons therefor or requesting a single extension of 30 sitting days to consider the bill, and giving the reasons therefor. If no bill or report is presented by the end of the 60 sitting days where no extension has been approved by the House, or by the end of the 30-sitting-day extension if approved by the House, the bill shall be deemed to have been reported without amendment.
Liberal
Rob Oliphant Liberal Don Valley West, ON
On that, I would say the motion probably is then in good order and the amendment would not be in order. However, I would say to the committee we will.... I would disagree with the member that things like the report on Ukraine, which we did take extensive time on, weren't important. It's not as though they were unimportant things this committee was doing, and it was even at the behest of his party that we moved on those issues, so there are things we have done.
On that, I think a 30-day request is reasonable; we should make an argument to the House that we need 30 more days. The whole committee has the commitment on this side that we will do everything we can to make sure that it happens sooner than 30 days. We have a subcommittee meeting now; we can look at our agenda and we can plan it out and in good faith, and we'll find a way to report on this as soon as possible, while giving every member the chance to make sure the bill is a good bill.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Sorry, Chair, I have a point of order. Did you rule my amendment out of order?
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Okay.
I think, again, it's important for us to do this quickly. I think, frankly, we could still get it done by Wednesday and it would probably require extra meetings, but I want to see this bill pass.
Conservative
Randy Hoback Conservative Prince Albert, SK
Mr. Chair, it's past one o'clock. I have another meeting to go to. I can't sit here and—
Liberal
Conservative
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ali Ehsassi
Don't we have to deal with the motion?
We could leave the motion as is.
Liberal
Rob Oliphant Liberal Don Valley West, ON
Mr. Chair, the problem is that if we don't deal with this today to get it to the House in time with the report, we may miss the opportunity. That's why I think it's important we get it done quickly. I would ask if you would consider calling a vote so we could defeat it or pass it.
