Government Operations Committee on May 26th, 2021

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you, Ms. Harder.

Mr. Kusmierczyk.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you again, Mr. Chair.

The only other thing I wanted to add—a bit of new information, I guess—is that all along this whole year at committee we have gladly agreed to any number of investigations, documents to be produced and order papers to be provided. Absolutely, we've always done that. We welcome it. We welcome providing and getting information, but at every juncture, whenever we've made a decision to get order papers or to look at Nuctech or to look at this or to bring this person here or to invite that person, there's always a reason.

Here, there is an absence of an explanation, an absence of a reason, other than just because. I don't think that's sufficient to pull someone into the public sphere, into the spotlight, for whatever reason, but that's what we're asking for.

At every single juncture this year at this committee, we have absolutely agreed to get information, to provide information, to get additional information and to have witnesses come in, all of that stuff, but there's always been an explanation as to why we're doing that. It wasn't willy-nilly. It wasn't just a whim. We owe it to these folks that, if we're going to shine the spotlight on them, we better damn well have a reason why. I haven't heard it, and that's what I'm asking for. It's basic decency. What's the reason? I haven't heard it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you, Mr. Kusmierczyk.

I see no further hands up. Is there any further discussion?

Seeing none, and as we do not have consensus, I will call for a recorded vote.

[The Clerk]

Mr. Chair, that is five yeas and five nays. It is a tie vote.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you, Mr. Clerk.

I vote in favour.

(Motion as amended agreed to: yeas 6; nays 5)

With that, we will now move forward. Looking at the clock and bearing in mind the time commitments, I respectfully want to thank the witnesses who truly, I know, understand the process and the procedures. I appreciate their attendance and their responding to our questions today.

Mr. Glover, Ms. Hazen, Ms. Cahill and Mr. Brouillard, thank you for attending and for your presentations. With that said, I will dismiss you today. Thank you.

We do have a couple of things as a committee that we need to continue. I will remind committee members to keep in mind that we are still sitting in a public meeting while we're doing committee business.

Right now, I would like to discuss the main estimates for 2021-22. The order of reference for the committee to study the main estimates expires on Monday, May 31, 2021. As this is the last scheduled meeting before that date, the committee can, if it wishes, proceed to taking a decision on the votes that were referred to the committee.

Does the committee wish to vote on the main estimates? Do we have unanimous consent to vote?

[Francis Drouin, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Chair, I assume we'll be adopting those on division.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

The answer is basically yes. We have 23 votes on the main estimates that were referred to the committee. I see that there's no objection, although I do believe it would be asked that we consent to that on division.

CANADA POST CORPORATION

Vote 1—Payments to the Corporation for special purposes..........$22,210,000

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

CANADA SCHOOL OF PUBLIC SERVICE

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$63,006,675

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

CANADIAN INTERGOVERNMENTAL CONFERENCE SECRETARIAT

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$5,596,230

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

CANADIAN TRANSPORTATION ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION AND SAFETY BOARD

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$31,156,943

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC WORKS AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES

Vote 1—Operating expenditures..........$2,704,667,883

Vote 5—Capital expenditures..........$1,632,968,893

(Votes 1 and 5 agreed to on division)

NATIONAL CAPITAL COMMISSION

Vote 1—Payments to the Commission for operating expenditures..........$71,036,181

Vote 5—Payments to the Commission for capital expenditures..........$84,945,549

(Votes 1 and 5 agreed to on division)

OFFICE OF THE GOVERNOR GENERAL’S SECRETARY

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$20,427,563

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

OFFICE OF THE PARLIAMENTARY BUDGET OFFICER

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$6,520,482

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

OFFICE OF THE PUBLIC SECTOR INTEGRITY COMMISSIONER

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$5,118,271

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

PRIVY COUNCIL OFFICE

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$172,348,874

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$80,160,078

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

SENATE

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$79,080,673

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

SHARED SERVICES CANADA

Vote 1—Operating expenditures..........$1,603,400,792

Vote 5—Capital expenditures..........$209,982,042

(Votes 1 and 5 agreed to on division)

TREASURY BOARD SECRETARIAT

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$281,146,231

Vote 5—Government Contingencies..........$750,000,000

Vote 10—Government-wide Initiatives..........$111,151,120

Vote 20—Public Service Insurance..........$3,048,119,626

Vote 25—Operating Budget Carry Forward..........$1,600,000,000

Vote 30—Paylist Requirements..........$600,000,000

Vote 35—Capital Budget Carry Forward..........$600,000,000

(Votes 1, 5, 10, 20, 25, 30 and 35 agreed to on division)

With that said, shall I report the votes back to the House?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

The next thing will be on the supplementary estimates (A) 2021-22. Just so that you're aware, we think that they will be tabled in the House of Commons soon and referred to committees. The President of the Treasury Board has already confirmed that he will attend to discuss this on Wednesday, June 16. We are still waiting to hear from the other ministers.

One of the issues we need to recognize is that, concerning the agreement on the supplementary estimates, we have to do that three days prior to the last allotted day. I'm going to ask the clerk to clarify my short version of it for you, so that you truly understand.

[The Clerk]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

What you're referring to is, in fact, the deadline for the committee to consider the votes related to the supplementary estimates. It's not a hard and fast deadline such as for the main estimates, which is written in the Standing Orders.

The deadline is determined by when the government chooses the last allotted day will be, and unfortunately, we don't know what that day will be. When that day is designated, the committee will lose its order of reference three sitting days prior to that day. This is why we recommend that committees try to do the supplementary estimates sooner rather than later to ensure that they still have the vote before them.

That being said, if the committee has the opportunity to hear from the minister and wants to, it may still do so if the order of reference has lapsed, because that information falls under the subject matter mandate of the committee. It doesn't prohibit the committee from hearing from the minister; however, if it's after the date, the committee cannot put the question on the actual votes.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you, Mr. Clerk.

As I indicated, we're still waiting to hear from the Minister of Digital Government and the Minister of Public Services and Procurement Canada, and hopefully we'll hear from them soon.

One last thing I want to cover is that we sent out to the committee last week the letter we received from Tango, indicating that they were declining attendance to our meeting. We had that scheduled for June 7, and we still have that scheduled. At this point in time, we have confirmation from PHAC and PSPC.

With that said, and recognizing the shortness of time that we're dealing with, I'm going to ask the committee if they would be prepared to give the chair permission to write a letter and draft it in consultation with the law clerk to indicate, remind and clarify to the witnesses that any testimony before the committee is protected. That's in the hopes that they might reconsider their denial. Do I have consent for that?

Mr. Drouin, I think you want to say something.

[Francis Drouin, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Just to clarify, Mr. Chair, we will ask for the advice of the law clerk to write back to the witness to say that the information that he may or may not provide at our committee is protected so that it cannot be used in the court of law.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Basically the letter would be written by us to ask them to reconsider, but in doing so, we would run it by the law clerk to make certain that we're not saying something that is contrary to the issue. Is everyone in favour with that?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

With that said, I would like to thank everyone for being with us today.

The meeting is adjourned.