Evidence of meeting #37 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was projects.
A recording is available from Parliament.
3:45 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
Thank you.
The ruling of the chair is that the motion of Mr. Martin—
3:45 p.m.
Conservative
Brian Jean Conservative Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB
The motion itself is debatable, and this is another motion that is debatable.
3:45 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
No, I've made a ruling.
In consultation with the clerk, I made the ruling that the motion is in order because it deals with the business under consideration. Let me finish my sentence. Hence, that was the ruling. I asked you if you are challenging the ruling of the chair. You said yes. The ruling of the chair, according to Standing Order 117, cannot be challenged. If you challenge the chair, she has to call a vote for the ruling. You have challenged me, and we're going to call a vote.
3:45 p.m.
Conservative
3:45 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
The challenge is not debatable. The process is that my ruling has been challenged. I am consulting the clerk. The clerk informs me that the motion is in order. I would therefore like to pose the question.
Shall the chair's ruling be sustained, i.e. acceptance of Mr. Martin's motion?
Yes, sir.
3:45 p.m.
Conservative
Brian Jean Conservative Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB
Could the clerk confirm whether or not your motion itself is debatable, the challenge to the chair? Is that not debatable? I understand that the motion put forward by Mr. Martin is, but if I could be so obvious as to state the obvious, we are talking about a situation that is, quite frankly, taking away from the time of members to ask the officials questions. So why don't we go past Mr. Martin? They've already come here for an hour and we're going to spend time debating whether they are going to stay for another half hour. It's going to take us half an hour to debate that.
3:45 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
That is exactly what you are doing. I have to get the vote on my ruling. You cannot challenge the clerk because the clerk has given me advice based on the fact that the motion is in order. The motion relates directly to the business under consideration. You are challenging my ruling. I will call the vote.
Those who wish to sustain the chair's ruling, please indicate.
(Ruling of the chair sustained)
The ruling is sustained. Mr. Martin, your motion is carried.
We will now start off with the questions—
3:50 p.m.
Conservative
Patrick Brown Conservative Barrie, ON
On a point of order, it's fair enough for your ruling, but we haven't had a discussion of Mr. Martin's motion. We should be given an opportunity to offer some input on his motion.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
Unfortunately, it is now the apple before the cart, and the cart has gone forth.
3:50 p.m.
Conservative
Patrick Brown Conservative Barrie, ON
You called for a vote on your ruling. Did you call for a vote on his motion? Was that a double vote?
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
Mr. Brown, I'll explain. Mr. Martin put a motion and I consulted the clerk. I was told that it is in order. I stated it is in order. Mr. Jean challenged that ruling. When a ruling is challenged—and I'm sorry, Ministers, that you have to put up with this—then under procedure I have to call a vote. We voted, and Mr. Martin's motion is deemed to have stayed. There is no other debate.
I think we would like to have some input from the ministers, and we will start with our first....
Mr. Jean, you have a point of order.
3:50 p.m.
Conservative
Brian Jean Conservative Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB
I'd like a ruling from the clerk in relation to this, Madam Chair. This is a debatable motion, and we have the opportunity to debate his motion whether I challenged you or not. That has nothing to do with the motion that Mr. Martin has put forward. That motion is fully debatable, and I want to have the opportunity to do so.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
—I think it was Mr. Gourde first, and then Ms. Hall Findlay.
Go ahead, Mr. Gourde.
October 29th, 2009 / 3:50 p.m.
Conservative
Jacques Gourde Conservative Lotbinière—Chutes-de-la-Chaudière, QC
Madam Chair, can we really vote? We voted on the motion, but we did not have the French version. I am not sure I properly understood the motion.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
Give me one second.
Do you want to have a look at the motion? Because the motion is from the floor, Mr. Martin, do you have a French version of the motion, or did you just present the motion on the floor, which was relevant to the business of the committee?
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
Martha Hall Findlay Liberal Willowdale, ON
Because we do actually want to hear from the ministers, I would just ask if we can postpone debate on that particular motion, which relates only to asking the departmental officials to stay, until after the ministers have left.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
Fair enough. Thank you.
Shall we start with the first round of questions?
Madam Hall Findlay, for eight minutes.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
Martha Hall Findlay Liberal Willowdale, ON
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
Once again, thank you, everyone, for being here.
Thank you for spending some time with us this afternoon.
One of our most important responsibilities as parliamentarians is in fact the oversight of government spending, and this here involves a great deal of government spending. Unfortunately, despite repeated requests....
Minister Baird, you appeared before this committee many months ago in the spring, and at that time I was already asking you for answers identifying projects and how much money had been spent. I had a real concern about announcements and announcements, but announcements don't create jobs, and we asked for details.
We have continued to ask for details. We have had very little response. To do our jobs, to fulfill our responsibility to Canadians, we then asked the Parliamentary Budget Officer to assist us by providing us with that information.
The Parliamentary Budget Officer appeared before this committee two days ago, and his answer to our questions about the details on government spending was that he had not been given adequate information to be able to answer us. So I will repeat: for us to be able to do our jobs, to fulfill our responsibility to Canadians, we need this information.
When I asked the Parliamentary Budget Officer why he was not being provided that information, he replied, “I think you'll have an opportunity later this week to have the Minister of Transport and Infrastructure and perhaps the deputy minister as well”, suggesting that because he couldn't give us that information, we had to ask you for it.
At this point, I would very much like to ask you, because I recognize your enthusiasm to be able to speak in front of a committee, Minister, and I acknowledge your unique abilities in that regard, but we do have specific questions and I would really appreciate succinct answers.
The first question is, why has the Parliamentary Budget Officer not been given adequate information so that we can do our jobs for Canadians?
3:55 p.m.
Conservative
John Baird Conservative Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
I say to the member for Willowdale, thank you for the question. I'll commit to you to give just as succinct answers to the questions as your questions are. You gave a five-minute preamble before you asked the question, so I promise you I will take less time than you took to ask the question.
As soon as an announcement is made, the information is posted on the government's website, including the project description, the exact amount, and the location. We'll continue to provide an unprecedented amount of information on all of our infrastructure projects being funded. In fact, in the first seven months of the fiscal year, we committed more money in the infrastructure stimulus fund than the previous Liberal governments spent in seven years. Under the previous government, all the public ever received was a press release; you really had to dig around to get even the most basic information.
Earlier today we provided more than three boxes of information to the Parliamentary Budget Officer.
