Government Operations Committee on Oct. 9th, 2025

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

We're in committee business. He's tabled the motion, so we're debating the motion.

I have a speaking order. I have Ms. Khalid.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

I am not able to view the text of the motion. I'm wondering if you can suspend the meeting while you distribute to us paper copies of the motion. I'm not able to access it on my phone at this time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Perhaps you can share with one of your members.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I'd prefer to have my own copy, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Okay.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I would like to also suspend the meeting so that I can discuss this with my colleagues. This is a bit of a surprise. I would have loved advance notice.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Sure, we could suspend for, say, five minutes.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I would prefer 10, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

I'll give you five.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

We'll see. Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

It's not a “We'll see.” You don't determine this, Ms. Khalid, and I appreciate your humour with it, but we'll give you five, okay?

We're suspended.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thank you for your patience, everyone. We are back.

Ms. Sudds, go ahead.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

I have two points to make.

The first is around your earlier comments about when the minister is coming, if I may. I hadn't had a chance to discuss that. October 23, of course, is great. He can come to kick off that Canada Post study. I believe that both Minister Lightbound and Minister Ali have made themselves available for October 30, and I would—

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

It's for the same hour, though. Normally, we'd get them for one hour and one hour. My understanding is it's for the exact same hour.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

My understanding is that they had agreed to both come and to split the time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

It's to split one hour, not two hours.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

I was under the impression that it was an hour and a half.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

No. It was going to be one hour and 20 minutes and another hour and 20 minutes, which would allow us to get most of the rounds in. I would be happy with one hour and one hour, but not one shared hour or a shared one hour and 20 minutes.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

That's at the discretion.... My point is it would be better to have him sooner than later. If he's made himself available for October 30, that would be advantageous for all of us to hear from him directly on his mandate, as well as, of course, Minister Ali. That's my first point.

My second point, with respect to the motion, is that it would have been lovely to have advance notice. Obviously, it was translated and ready to go, but regardless, here we are.

I'd like to suggest an amendment to the motion, simply to change the starting date. It has “one meeting to be scheduled no later than October 28”. I would suggest that this study not be started until all witnesses from the Canada Post study have been at committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

There is one issue about that. We said that October 23 and October 28 are for Canada Post.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

That's correct.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Are you saying after October 28? However, there may be other witnesses after that, so—

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

That's correct.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

—for the study, if we have the estimates, we could end up with one day in February.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

The point is that we had decided to prioritize the Canada Post study, and I don't want to disrupt the flow of witnesses and start this before we have heard from them.