Evidence of meeting #130 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was subcommittee.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
That's right. We'll hit the fifth hour. It's Mr. Bachrach's study, and says he's fine with that, because we've used up all the witnesses who have agreed.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
That's wonderful. Thank you.
I think that's everything that I needed to do.
Wednesday is one hour, the final hour with Canada Post. Then we have Minister Anand on the supplementary (A)s. I assume we're still sitting Wednesday.
Liberal
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
No, I know nothing that anyone doesn't know.
I'm pretty sure that's clear.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Chair, can I raise a point of order on something?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
I was just going to get to the indigenous study, but go ahead.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
I was going to say that I think we have a deadline on that of June 20 that we had given ourselves.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
I'm going to get to that now.
On the notice paper, if you recall our motion from April 10, there was a request for documents from all the departments for indigenous procurement and contracting. The last line makes it necessary to conduct a longitudinal study of the matter in committee or subcommittee as long as the decision is made before Thursday, June 20.
Time allocation has started on Bill C-69. We'll see bells in about 10 minutes, but hopefully we can just continue through that and put to bed this motion on this issue.
I'll go to Mr. Genuis to speak about how we'll move forward with the study from April 10.
If you wish, I'll have the clerk send out a copy of the motion.
Go ahead as it's going out.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
You're distributing the motion that we adopted.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Reviewing it, I was just going to suggest that the language of the motion envisions that the subcommittee would meet at times when the House is not meeting. I suggest we make an exception to that, at least to allow us to have the organizing meeting take place before the end of this week, and we can decide how we want to proceed at that point. Rather than having an organizing committee meeting take place in the summer, I think it would maybe make more sense to authorize that to happen this week while we're all here anyway. I don't think there will be that much happening towards the end of the week anyway.
I'll just say, from my perspective, having looked at the documents and the lack of documents, that there is a real need for us to dig into this. We received virtually no information around subcontractors. There have been some more stories that came out—a piece in La Presse at the end of last week—and more concerns about essentially how it looks like some folks are gaming the system, and benefits that are supposed to be flowing to indigenous communities are rather being taken up by a small number of Ottawa-based actors under circumstances that certainly, to put it charitably, merit further investigation.
My proposal is that we do that initial organizing meeting, let's say, Thursday or Friday, which I think we would have to agree to since it's a notwithstanding of the existing motion.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
I think, Mr. Savard-Tremblay, this covers some of the things you were asking Mr. Giroux about regarding the indigenous contracting. I'm fine to find resources for a half-hour or an hour on Wednesday. I don't want to bump Canada Post or Minister Anand, but perhaps we could do that Wednesday or Thursday.
Mrs. Atwin, you had your hand up, but you put it down.
Liberal
Jenica Atwin Liberal Fredericton, NB
Yes, I was going to speak to that, but we're good. I'm okay with that.
Bloc
Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
From our side, we agree with the proposal, but we suggest that it be done on Wednesday, after the meeting that is already scheduled.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
Mr. Savard-Tremblay suggested that we continue after Ms. Anand's time at the meeting on Wednesday, just to set up a go-forward. Mr. Genuis suggested a stand-alone meeting to set this up and get going on it.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
I haven't received the motion. I was waiting to receive it.
Conservative
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Chair, just to clarify, then, are you talking about that...?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
Your suggestion was to do a stand-alone meeting later this week. I think that would be fine. I can find time. Mr. Savard-Tremblay suggested that stand-alone be after the Wednesday meeting, when we're here anyway, and then not on Thursday.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Okay. I don't know if it's a “we”, because it's a subcommittee.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
You're saying after Wednesday. I'm okay with that.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
It would probably be easier to find resources to continue on.
Why don't we suspend for five minutes? You guys can read the motion.
