Health Committee on Feb. 2nd, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

I call the meeting back to order.

Welcome back to meeting number four of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health.

Today we are meeting in public to discuss a report from our subcommittee and to reach decisions on future business.

I will dispense with the preliminaries and simply advise the committee that your subcommittee met on Monday, January 31, to consider the business of the committee and agreed to make the following recommendation:

That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study of the Emergency Situation Facing Canadians in Light of the COVID-19 Pandemic and that the evidence and documentation received by the committee during the Second Session of the 43rd Parliament on the subject be taken into consideration by the committee in the current session, that the committee hold additional meetings on this study in the current session, and that the committee report its findings and recommendations to the House.

Colleagues, if we adopt this report, it will be as if we adopted a motion with the same text. We can amend the report before we adopt it, should changes be desired. We can also adopt other motions later to give us more clarity on how this study will unfold once we determine what our other business should be.

For clarity, the contents of the report are fair game. The other discussions that took place in subcommittee were held in camera and it wouldn't be appropriate to divulge them in public, but the report itself, and any amendments you wish to make to the report, are fair game.

The floor is now open for debate.

Mr. Berthold has the floor.

[Luc Berthold, Mégantic—L'Érable, CPC]

Thank you.

Mr. Chair, I want to propose an amendment to the report before us.

The amendment is more or less in the middle of the text. Instead of stating that “the committee hold additional meetings on this study in the current session,” the motion should state that “the committee hold at least half of its additional meetings on this study during this current session.”

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Mr. Berthold.

The debate now concerns the amendment, which recommends that half of the time be spent on this topic.

On the list I have Mr. van Koeverden.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have just an amendment that we should add something to the end of the motion so that it would read, “through Standing Order 109, that the committee request a government response”.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Mr. van Koeverden.

The debate at present is on the amendment proposed by Monsieur Berthold. Let's dispense with that, and then we will consider the amendment you've put forward.

The debate, colleagues, right now is on the amendment put forward by Monsieur Berthold with respect to the fifty-fifty division of time being dedicated to this study.

Is there any further debate on the amendment?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Chair, would you just mind reading out the motion as amended, please?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

I'll need some help with that.

Mr. Berthold, can you read the amendment that you moved?

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Yes. It's “that the committee hold at least half of these additional meetings on this study during the current session”.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Is there any further debate on the amendment as presented?

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. Naaman Sugrue]

Mr. Chair, I would just like clarity on the terminology. It says “additional meetings”. Is that referring to remaining meetings for this calendar year? I'm not aware of us having access to meetings outside our normal time slots.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Mr. Berthold, I think that the issue is the use of the word “additional.”

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

The word “additional” is currently included in the motion drafted by the clerk. I don't mind if the word is removed by another amendment. I just added, “hold at least half of its meetings.” However, if the word “additional” is too much, I have no issue with stating in my amendment that the word should be removed.

Basically, Mr. Chair, I want the report to state that half the committee meetings in this session will be on COVID‑19. The clerk could suggest the exact wording for that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

I think that it's clearer this way.

Do you want the clerk to talk about it?

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

He could suggest the exact words to use in the amendment so that the motion fulfills its purpose.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

I understand your point, Mr. Berthold.

Mr. Clerk, is that clearer now?

[The Clerk]

Yes, I understand. I don't think that any changes are necessary. I was the one who misunderstood.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Okay.

Dr. Powlowski, go ahead, please.

[Marcus Powlowski, Liberal, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

I have a procedural question. Does this commit us then for the whole session? I'm just thinking if two months down the line it turns out that, lo and behold, there are not a lot of COVID cases, we realize that we may want to spend more time dealing with issues other than COVID. Are we bound by this decision, or can we change it at a later date?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

My understanding is that we can decide that the study is now wrapping up and we're ready to proceed to a report. The committee can, through a motion, alter course.

I see Mr. Berthold, but I understand that we have a problem with the phone lines, which is preventing some of our staffers from being able to join. We need to suspend to get those connected.

Colleagues, I'm going to suspend the meeting for five minutes to resolve this technical issue and then I'm going to come back to Mr. Lake, who is on the list in the room.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

I call the meeting back to order.

Colleagues, when we suspended, we were debating Mr. Berthold's amendment to the subcommittee report calling for a fifty- [Technical difficulty—Editor] and any other work we may undertake.

I recognize Mr. Lake.

[Mike Lake, Edmonton—Wetaskiwin, CPC]

Could we read the motion as it stands right now?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Mr. Clerk, do you have it before you?

[The Clerk]

Yes. The motion as it stands is the exact text of the subcommittee report.

The motion as amended, if that's what you'd like to hear, Mr. Lake, I will read now: “That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study of the Emergency Situation Facing Canadians in Light of the COVID-19 Pandemic and that the evidence and documentation received by the committee during the Second Session of the 43rd Parliament on the subject be taken into consideration by the committee in the current session, that the committee hold additional meetings on this study in the current session, that the committee dedicate at least half of its meetings to this study, and that the committee report its findings and recommendations to the House.”

The committee could also put an end date to that fifty-fifty qualifier if it so desired, or it could, some time later, pass a motion that overrides it, thereby putting an end to the fifty-fifty requirement.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Mr. Lake.

[Mike Lake]

I have a couple of thoughts.

The question came up earlier about the ability to not study interminably if we decide there is no need for that. I would just say that the committee can make that decision. We're masters of our own domain, here, so we can easily make that decision and hopefully we work well enough to do that.

This might be a friendly amendment, and I know it's my own colleague moving the amendment in the first place, so it would be a subamendment, in a sense, to say that rather than “at least half”, I think it should be “half”. I don't think we necessarily want more than half of these meetings to be COVID related. I think striking the words “at least” and just saying “hold half of its meetings” makes sense.

There has been some discussion and I think that might be in the spirit, but I'll look to my colleague to see if that is amenable.