Evidence of meeting #46 for Health in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was documents.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you, Ms. Sidhu.
We go now to Ms. Rempel Garner.
Go ahead, please, Ms. Rempel Garner.
12:05 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
Thank you, Chair.
My understanding on how we got here to this day is that, in the summer of last year, the Liberal government prorogued Parliament, which delayed committees for some time, and then I remember the Liberal members on this committee filibustering programming motions that would have allowed us to study issues. What it meant is that it took several meetings and actually a House order to get the health committee onto an agenda.
Then we had to use additional procedure to get the agenda set for the last several meetings of the committee, which included studying the government's COVID response, including long-term care—I'll get to that in a second—and there were several meetings of filibuster as well with the Liberals here. My understanding is that Liberal members on this committee have utilized the tactic of filibuster to waste, I would say, several meetings when we could have been looking at other issues. Opposition members have actually had to use House motions to compel the committee to to do its work. It has a been a very frustrating year for me.
Where we were today, Chair, was that we had passed a programming motion for the last several meetings, as you are aware. The Liberals had an opportunity through their filibusters of that motion, as well as that motion, to amend and include other options. They did not raise the issue of long-term care at that point in time.
I'm a little puzzled as to why.... I'm not puzzled. I know why we're here today. I think actually it was my colleague Mr. Davies who put out a little statement that I want to read into the record very briefly, because I think it sums it up: “Liberals misusing the appalling conditions in long-term care as a political ploy is a slap in the face to all seniors in care. We don’t need more 'study'—the problems are crystal clear and families need action. Liberal rhetoric and refusal to act costs lives.”
Chair, my understanding is that we had this meeting set today. There was a notice of meeting that went out to have the law clerk and other commissioners come to the committee to look at the fact that there is a probable case of contempt in the government's refusing to provide unredacted documents, as ordered by the House of Commons, to this committee for review. We had the deputy minister of procurement come before committee and confirm that the government did not provide unredacted documents to the law clerk, and today's meeting was supposed to get clarity from the law clerk in that regard.
Of course, then, after the notice of meeting went out, you cancelled the meeting, Chair, and this meeting was put forward to discuss a study that could have been put forward by the Liberals some time ago.
I firmly believe that the government does need to act on long-term care. I believe Ms. Sidhu just made the following comment: that it was “irresponsible” to not make adjustments after the first wave. I agree with her. The appalling conditions we saw in many long-term care facilities happened in early 2020. That occurred before the government prorogued Parliament and before the government members on this committee filibustered motions to study. I'll also point out that many witnesses from the long-term care community actually testified in front of this committee after opposition members managed to pass this.
As Mr. Davies said in his statement—and members were reading what the government had put in the budget—the government has every impetus to act in this regard. I know that they have a panel of people, but they haven't acted on national standards of care, let's say, or anything yet. They haven't done that.
The other thing I want to talk about is the government's acting on recommendations. We were supposed to have a meeting today essentially to deal with the fact that the government did not act on recommendations. In fact, an order of this committee, which was to provide unredacted documents to the law clerk for review.... My faith in this government's ability to respond to recommendations from this committee is limited.
I share the concern of my colleague Mr. Davies that the government would use this issue as a filibuster to filibuster their own motion. If they really wanted this, there were number of ways they could have put this forward, but we had the parliamentary secretary speak for over a half an hour. It's clear we're in a filibuster of the Liberals' own motion.
Given that, I move:
That the Committee proceed to resume the agreed upon meetings in accordance with the motion passed on June 2, 2021.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you, Ms. Rempel Garner.
That motion is not in order. We do have a motion on the floor.
12:10 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
I challenge your ruling. It is a non-debatable dilatory motion, and it should be in order.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
A motion to adjourn the debate would have been in order, but this motion is not a motion to adjourn the debate—
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you.
The question is this: Shall the decision of the chair be sustained?
(Ruling of the chair overturned: nays 6; yeas 5)
Very well, the committee has decided that the motion is in order.
Ms. Rempel Garner, would you please move your motion at this point?
12:10 p.m.
Conservative
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
I'm sorry. Could you remind me exactly what the wording of the motion is?
12:10 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
I move:
That the Committee proceed to resume the agreed upon meetings in accordance with the motion passed on June 2, 2021.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you.
Is there any debate on this? I see a number of hands up. I don't know if they're up regarding this motion or not.
12:10 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
On a point of order, Chair, it's a non-debatable motion.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
No, it's not a non-debatable motion. It's not a motion to adjourn the debate. It's a separate motion completely—
12:10 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
It is a dilatory motion, Chair, on a point of order. I challenge your ruling.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
I hear you. Thank you so much.
The question is this: Shall the decision of the chair that this is a debatable motion be sustained?
(Ruling of the chair overturned: nays 6; yeas 5)
It looks like it's the will of the committee that this is not a debatable motion. Therefore, we will go to the vote.
(Motion agreed to: yeas 6; nays 5)
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you, committee.
Ms. O'Connell, go ahead on a point of order, please.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
Mr. Chair, I'd like to get some clarification from the clerk.
I get that we went through those votes, but how can members of a committee determine whether something is debatable or not? If that was the case, then every single debate could be shut down and parliamentary privilege would be an issue.
Mr. Chair, I'm going to put it on notice that the members who just voted to make a debatable motion non-debatable just potentially infringed on our parliamentary privilege to debate.
Members opposite may have the majority of the votes, but they don't get to rewrite the rules. They don't get to override privilege. I would suggest that you confer with the clerk about the actual technicality of what just happened here. If not, as I've said, I will be giving notice of a breach of privilege by the members just now. I suggest you confer—
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
Excuse me, Ms. Rempel Garner, I have the floor. You like to make up your own rules, but you have not been recognized—
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
—so I don't want to be interrupted again.
Thank you.
Mr. Chair, can you please confer with the clerk to determine if members' privilege was just breached?
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
Yes, I would just like to remind colleagues that there are three types of dilatory motions, which means non-debatable motions: adjourn debate, adjourn a meeting or proceed to whatever.
I did move a motion that was that the committee proceed to, which was on an already agreed upon matter of business in the committee, so it is in fact a non-debatable motion. This is why members raised a challenge to your ruling, which was incorrect, as it was a dilatory motion. Members who voted against the sustainment of your ruling actually were voting in favour of sustaining our parliamentary privilege, because your ruling was incorrect. Now there has been a vote that has passed. We need to move on to the matter of business that was at hand earlier today.
Again, for the member to say that privilege has been breached, it's a little rich, given that what we were debating, which they were trying to filibuster, was the release of documents that the government refuses to provide to the committee under a House order.
We now need to have the witnesses here so that we can proceed with the questioning, as was originally scheduled on Friday. This is just ridiculous at this point.