Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Feb. 14th, 2008

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you.

Monsieur Lemieux.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

If I'm not mistaken, it is amendable, as you stated. His motion is amendable.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

It's debatable and amendable, but I'm not making a decision right now because I'm trying to figure out if I'm still on this original point of clarification by Madam Jennings, which I haven't solved.

Are you clear you don't need anything?

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

I'm clear.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Colleagues, then this round of points of order, based on Madam Jennings' original, is finished. It's done. Hang on. You may have another point of order and perhaps maybe even the same point, but technically Madam Jennings is satisfied and we're right back to the same thing. I will not have points of order on something that we've already decided on and have already moved forward on.

So where we are right now is exactly where we were 15 minutes ago, give or take a couple of minutes, where Monsieur Lemieux has a perfectly legal motion on the floor, and he's the first speaker. Madam Redman is next, and so on and so forth. If there are other points of order I'm happy to hear them, but it sounds to me as if we've gone full circle and we're back to where we should have been in the first point.

I'm getting some negatives from Mr. Godin, so I will hear Mr. Godin, please.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Chairman, I just want you to explain to us, if it's possible.

On the orders of the day, to me there's a difference between future business or committee business. The committee business is to continue what we started. With future business, we come out with what we want. But this is committee business, and the committee business we already have started. That's why I say it supersedes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

I have to follow the rules.

There is a point of order.... I'm sorry; one second, please.

Monsieur Lemieux is on the list. Mr. Lemieux, you're next, and then Mr. Preston.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Thanks, Chair.

I was going to discuss some of this a little bit later, but I may as well mention some of it now.

There are many outstanding matters in front of the committee. Maybe I should go to asking for the question here, but I'm just saying, Monsieur Godin, that—

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Through the chair, please.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

He's been doing that since nine o'clock this morning.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Thank you.

What I was going to say is that there are many outstanding matters in front of the committee. For example, there's the first report of the steering committee. Well, it is sitting there to be looked at. It could be considered business of the committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

I'm sorry, I'm going to rule that as debate. I think we're getting into debate. If you have a point to make, I'm happy to hear it, but I'm hearing debate now.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I was just going to get to my point.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Okay, please.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

All I'm pointing out is that the argument Monsieur Godin made on his point of order is actually not relevant, because there's much outstanding business within the committee. My motion is put forward as committee business.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Mr. Preston, please. Is it on the point?

[Joe Preston, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

It's on the same point, Chair, yes.

There's much committee business before us. I leave it to you to decide which committee business is it. It seems as though Mr. Lemieux's motion is in order.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Mr. Lemieux, please, proceed on your motion.

Madam Redman will be next.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I was saying that, as a member, I think that the committee has an important job to do. Personally, I believe we are not on the right track and have not been for a long time. We decided in committee, for example, that the bills that are really important for us, in the committee, and for the government, are also important for Canadians. When I say “government”, I mean each of the members and all the parties that are trying to work together in the House.

We have a real job to do. That is why it's important to focus our efforts on the business that is really important.

I mentioned that there are outstanding matters of business that the committee has not been considering because we've been sidetracked by Madam Redman's motion, which is actually not key to the work of the committee. And I'll say the unfortunate part is that it's not the first time that has come up. There is, of course, the first report of the steering committee, and this has just generated itself into a second report to the steering committee, which of course we were in the process of debating.

But there are actually other pieces of legislation that are very important to the committee and to Canadians. I have brought forward Bill C-6, which is an act to amend the Canada Elections Act, but this is only one piece of legislation, or one, I suppose, important piece of work that we need to do.

For example, I'll just bring up a second one. There's actually a statutory requirement regarding this next piece of business, and that is to review the provisions of Bill C-3, an act to amend the Canada Elections Act and the Income Tax Act, and it concerns the registration of political parties under the Canada Elections Act as a result of the Figueroa case. As a committee, we have a statutory requirement to consider this case and to proceed with it. Instead, we're losing valuable time, so the important work of the committee is stacking up while the opposition is floundering around trying to basically sidetrack the committee in the important work that we are trying to undertake.

I'll say that fortunately today, thanks to my motion, we have an opportunity to work together as a committee to get the committee back on track. It's perfect. I want to explain, though. I'm not too sure that we all agree, and that's why it's going to take some persuasion, I'm sure, because what we have seen from the opposition is that in their actions, Chair, they don't agree. They would rather be moving off into left field in terms of hunting down phantoms as opposed to doing the real work of the committee, and that's why it's important that I take time to explain why I've put my motion forward and why it's important to the committee.

I think it's within the context of how the committee has been operating so far, Chair. For example, I'll bring to light the fact that when I came to the committee.... And I haven't always been on this committee; I wasn't on this committee during the first session. So I'm assuming that some decisions were made during the first session of Parliament with respect to this committee, but certainly they were reiterated once I became a member, because I've certainly heard it not just from our members, but from you, as chair, and from the opposition members as well, that legislation is to take priority.

And why is that? Why would legislation take priority? Because it's in the best service of the House of Commons. We're all trying to work together as MPs, as political parties, to do what's best for Canadians. And I agree that we can have differing opinions, that we can have different points of view. But there are bills that come in front of the House, and they pass...certainly first reading. They go through first and second reading, and they move off to committee. Here we have a very important bill, Bill C-6, in front of our committee, and it's actually not on the agenda.

If we look at the orders of the day, we see it's just wide open--committee business. Yet here is a bill, I would say, of pressing importance because it involves elections, and who knows how close we are to an election. It also impacts byelections. There were byelections in the latter half of last year, but there are more byelections coming up. So here we have a bill that came out of the House of Commons with the support of the majority of MPs. It's come to committee, and it's been stagnating.

It's been sitting here. I'll even use the--

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

On a point of order, Mr. Proulx.

[Marcel Proulx, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Mr. Chair, you're a reasonable man. I'm questioning the relevance of Mr. Lemieux's speech, as we all agree around the table that we should vote on this. So why would he continue?

[An hon. member]

That's not a point of order at all.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

I don't think that's a point of order.

[Marcel Proulx, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

No, but it's a question of relevance.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

I agree with you. According to the rules, I can't. No one can call the question while I have people on my speaking list. And I have people on the speaking list.

He's speaking to the relevance of whether the committee should move immediately to the study of Bill C-6. So I'm going to let the gentleman speak, with the knowledge that there does seem to be some relevance. But you never know what's going to happen until the hands go up or down.

Monsieur Lemieux, please.