Government Operations Committee on Oct. 8th, 2020

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

That was going to be my suggestion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you, Mr. McCauley.

Is the committee comfortable with going one by one and going through the list as they were presented to us by the clerk?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

We'll go with the first motion, which is on analyst services, as follows:

That the committee retain, as needed and at the discretion of the Chair, the services of one or more analysts from the Library of Parliament to assist it in its work.

Do we have concurrence on that?

Just so people know, if you go back historically, the thumbs up is the negative and the thumbs down is the positive, but we'll pick the thumbs up as positive in this matter.

(Motion agreed to)

[The Clerk]

Mr. Chair, just as a point of clarification for the benefit of the members, traditionally the analysts are visible to the committee with their cameras on during a regular committee meeting. In light of the fact that they're only attached to the committees now, their cameras have been off. However, I have asked them to turn their cameras on now, and, if you permit, Mr. Chair, the analysts can introduce themselves now.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Certainly, I would be very happy to say hello and meet them so that everyone knows them.

[Raphaëlle Deraspe, Committee Researcher]

Good morning. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I've been with the committee for the last five years and am happy to be back. I'm pleased to meet you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

We're pleased to meet you, and thank you for coming back.

[Lindsay McGlashan, Committee Researcher]

Good morning. Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. It's a pleasure to be here. I look forward to supporting the work of the committee. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you very much. I appreciate it, and it was nice to meet you both. We look forward to working long hours and getting things done right.

We'll go to the second motion, which is on the subcommittee on agenda and procedure:

That the Subcommittee on Agenda and Procedure be established and be composed of five members, namely the Chair and one member from each recognized party; and that the subcommittee work in a spirit of collaboration.

(Motion agreed to)

The next is on meeting without a quorum:

That the Chair be authorized to hold meetings to receive evidence and to have that evidence printed when a quorum is not present, provided that at least four members are present, including two members of the opposition and two members of the government, but when travelling outside the Parliamentary Precinct, that the meeting begin after 15 minutes, regardless of members present.

(Motion agreed to)

The next is on the time for opening remarks and questioning of witnesses:

That witnesses be given ten minutes to make their opening statement; that, at the discretion of the Chair, during the questioning of witnesses, there be allocated six minutes for the first questioner of each party as follows: Conservative Party, Liberal Party, Bloc Québécois, New Democratic Party; that for the second and subsequent rounds, the order and time for questioning be as follows: Conservative Party, five minutes, Liberal Party, five minutes, Conservative Party, five minutes, Liberal Party, five minutes, Bloc Québécois, two and a half minutes and New Democratic Party, two and a half minutes.

Are there any questions?

I see hands up. We'll start with Mr. Gerretsen.

You had your hand up first.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

That was from before. I will take it down. Sorry about that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Madame Vignola.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

I have a suggestion to make—

Mr. Green, did you want to make a suggestion?

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Do I have the floor, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

I saw Ms. Vignola first, but she is right in the middle of....

It's whatever you would prefer.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

No, my apologies. I should note that there has been some back and forth with the translation, so I'll just make sure I switch back. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Okay. We'll go to Ms. Vignola first.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

I have a suggestion to make. I will read the motion that the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs has adopted. I liked the idea, so I'm suggesting it to you:

That witnesses be given five (5) minutes [instead of 10 minutes] for their opening statements; that whenever possible, witnesses provide the committee with their opening statements 72 hours in advance; that, at the discretion of the Chair, during the questioning of witnesses, there be allocated six (6) minutes for the first questioner of each party as follows [...]

Nothing changes for the first round. I will continue:

For the second and subsequent rounds, the order and time for questioning be as follows: Conservative Party, five (5) minutes Liberal Party, five (5) minutes Bloc Québécois, two and a half (2.5) minutes New Democratic Party, two and a half (2.5) minutes Conservative Party, five (5) minutes Liberal Party, five (5) minutes

So, instead of scheduling five-minute segments for the Conservative Party and the Liberal Party one after the other, we would let the Bloc Québécois and the New Democratic Party get their turn between two five-minute segments. Would that suit you?

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Do we have anything further?

Mr. Green, do you want to speak?

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Yes. I think now is the appropriate time just to acknowledge the fantastic work of our previous chair, Tom Lukiwski, who is now on PROC, and reference the fact that our committee, working in a collaborative spirit, actually made this a practice throughout COVID. I just want to take this moment and acknowledge his past chairpersonship and obviously support this to ensure that we have equitable interventions.

Thank you to the honourable member, Ms. Vignola, for bringing it up.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Mr. McCauley, I saw your hand go up.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Clerk, could you run through what we did most recently in the last group of meetings? I think that worked very well. I would think that maybe we could just stick with what worked before.

[The Clerk]

Thank you, Mr. McCauley.

The motion that existed originally is the one that the chair read. However, that did give discretion to the chair. The motion that Mr. Kitchen read, which was the original one in effect, gave discretion to the chair, who at the time was Mr. Lukiwski, to make modifications as he saw fit, which he did quite regularly. He did it based on the amount of time left, and he was able to manage that situation.

I've never heard any complaints from members about how he did that, but the original motion that existed at that time was the one that Mr. Kitchen read. The one that Madam Vignola read was actually adopted by PROC during their first meeting last week, I believe.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I don't know, Mr. MacKinnon—you've been here from the beginning as well—but I think how we had it recently worked very well and seemed fair, and it also allowed a bit of discretion when we needed to perhaps limit witness time. I think that worked well. I'd prefer to stick with the original.

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Gatineau, QC]

I would concur.