Health Committee on July 13th, 2020

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome, everyone, to meeting number 33 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health. Pursuant to the order of reference of May 26, 2020, the committee is resuming its briefing on the Canadian response to the outbreak of the coronavirus.

We are meeting today for the purpose of debating the notices of motion in Mr. Jeneroux's name.

If a member wishes to intervene in debate, they should use the “raise hand” function. This will signal to the chair your interest in speaking. To do so, you should click on “participants” at the bottom of the screen. When the list pops up, you will see, next to your name, that you can click “raise hand”.

I have reviewed the blues, and members had agreed to withdraw the motions currently under debate in order to reconsider them at a later date. I will therefore revert to what had been agreed to by the committee, as a starting point for our debate today.

The committee had agreed to amend Mr. Jeneroux's first motion, which is related to Dr. Tam's appearance on May 19, 2020 and the emergency stockpiles, by deleting “emails” from the list of documents required. The debate is therefore now back on the main motion as amended.

We will now open up debate on the main motion as amended, which means the main motion with “emails” removed.

I see Mr. Jeneroux's hand is up.

Please go ahead, Mr. Jeneroux.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I was under the impression that we were going to withdraw the motion in its entirety. If it's your opinion that we are starting from scratch, it seems a little sneaky. Nonetheless, I guess that's your opinion.

I'll begin my comments with the first motion. I won't bother reading it into the record, but for the committee's reference, the motions we're looking at are with regard to the wearing of masks and the advice that Dr. Theresa Tam had received.

This is our 33rd committee meeting, as the chair referenced in the opening remarks. We were one of the first committees to start, and we're still going. We've heard a lot of testimony that I think really lays out the groundwork that this particular government was not prepared, lacked a sense of urgency, and even, quite honestly, was boasting about how prepared they were.

These four motions are important, because they highlight the fact that we need to make sure, as a committee—and remember, Mr. Chair, we're separate from the government—that we get as much information as possible so that we're able to put forward a full and comprehensive report, with advice for any other future governments on any other potential pandemics in the future. That being the case, we want to make sure that we have all the information available before us. I hope that members of this committee will recognize this in these four motions, because it's imperative, I think, for the protection of Canadians, that we're as transparent as possible.

You may be friends with the Minister of Health. You may be friends with certain members of the government. However, at the end of the day, we as a committee have been tasked with finding as much information as possible in preparation for any other potential pandemics, for the safety of all Canadians. I implore the committee to consider this in our consideration of these motions as we move forward so that we're as transparent and accountable as possible.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Thank you, Mr. Jeneroux.

Mrs. Jansen, I see your hand is up. Please go ahead.

[Tamara Jansen, Conservative, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Sorry, but Ms. Sidhu had her hand up first. She can go first.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Very well. Go ahead, Ms. Sidhu.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Mr. Chair, I would like to add the following language, regarding vetting by the department, to all of MP Jeneroux's motions: “provided that the department does its assessment and vetting in gathering and releasing the documents as it would be done through the access to information process.”

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

On a point of order, we can only amend the motion that's on the floor at this moment.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Should I go ahead, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Propose your amendment as you wish it to be for this motion only.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

We are proposing to amend this motion to apply ATIP rules, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Do you have specific language, please?

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Yes, we do. It's “provided that the government does its assessment and vetting in gathering and releasing the documents as it would be done through the access to information process”.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

The amendment is in order. Is there any debate on the amendment?

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

We are following the same procedure, Mr. Chair, as prior health committee requests for the production of documents. This is the same amendment that was passed with both production of document motions by the committee on June 15.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Thank you, Ms. Sidhu.

Is there any discussion on the amendment?

Mr. Jeneroux, please go ahead.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

I certainly don't support this particular amendment, Mr. Chair.

If you recall, the last time we had documents provided to us, they were blacked out substantially. A bunch of information that would have been helpful, I think, in the preparation of the government and, quite frankly, for Canadians to understand in the lead-up to this pandemic is likely in that blacked-out information. By attempting to apply the ATIP rules.... We're separate from government. We're a committee. This is a committee made up of parliamentarians. It's actually quite shocking that this is the attempt by the government to hide this information even more.

We simply want, as a committee, to get to the bottom of this and to fully understand what advice was being given on some of this information. To simply black out.... I question why Ms. Sidhu would not want this type of information available for her constituents, for her own information, frankly, because at the end of the day, this is information that we need to prepare any report that we want to provide to future governments for future potential pandemics. We want to make sure that we have [Technical difficulty—Editor].

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Mr. Chair, may I?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Hold on. Mr. Jeneroux still has the floor.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

I'll wrap up, Mr. Chair.

Again, it's shocking that this is the attempt. In light of everything that has happened in the last week, I would implore this particular member to withdraw this amendment, because transparency is obviously what Canadians are looking for these days and this is just another attempt to hide that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Thank you, Mr. Jeneroux.

Mrs. Jansen, I apologize. You were actually next.

Please, go ahead now.

[Tamara Jansen, Conservative, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

That's all right. Thank you.

I'm extremely concerned. I've really found this committee work fascinating, and I thought that the idea was that we would be able to give Canadians a truly good picture of what happened and the types of reactions that were done. I think it's so important.

Canadians are scared. If we want Canadians not to be afraid, we need to ensure that we provide them with a really wholesome amount of information, and if we black stuff out, which happened with some of the documents we received via ATIPs, it's very concerning to Canadians because then it looks like there's something to hide. We need to make sure that it doesn't even appear that we're trying to hide something.

I would also urge and beg Ms. Sidhu to remove that change, because Canadians are scared. We owe it to them to be completely open and transparent so that they understand exactly what happened and why it happened, and so that they can once again feel confidence in the process.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Thank you, Mrs. Jansen.

Dr. Jaczek, please go ahead.

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

Thank you so much, Chair.

I'm going to be supporting Ms. Sidhu. Whenever we request information, it's really important to balance it with the natural privacy concerns of those involved in providing the information.

I think this committee already has approved similar language. It was not the subject of much dispute previously, and I fail to understand why, at this particular moment, the privacy aspects are apparently to be ignored by a couple of members from the committee who have spoken so far. We also need to be cognizant that this material will require information, access to information, potentially from other levels of government. Certainly, in terms of privacy issues for those other levels of governments' personnel who were involved in gathering this sort of information and providing this information, their privacy rights need to be respected.

I am definitely going to be supporting Ms. Sidhu in her proposed amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Thank you, Dr. Jaczek.

Ms. Kwan, please go ahead.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I'm subbing in for MP Don Davies.

Thank you for the opportunity for me to speak to the issue here.

With respect to the amendment, it is my understanding that through the last round of requests, when a similar request was made through the committee, much of the information did come back redacted. I think that is of concern if we are trying to access information and share information with the public.

On the issue of privacy in terms of names, phone numbers, emails and so on, it is certainly the case with other committees, in my experience, that the privacy component can address those issues in terms of ensuring that people's privacy is respected. I'm wondering whether it is the department officials who should be doing that work or whether it should be done elsewhere, with respect to the privacy component.

The other two aspects that I know other committees look at, in terms of the sharing of information, deal with national security and cabinet confidentiality. Those are the only two other aspects that would apply, so I'm not quite sure if the language of this amendment is referring to that normal process in that regard or if we are talking about something greater. Since this language was used before, with previous requests for information, and much material came back redacted, it would be hard to imagine that all of that stuff has to do with people's privacy in terms of the name and contact information.

I want to highlight that and urge Ms. Sidhu to reconsider this aspect, because if this amendment proceeds in the way it has previously, then I think it defeats the purpose of ensuring that information is made public and accountable to the public.