Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Nov. 22nd, 2007

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Let's bring the meeting to order.

Colleagues, we have a bit of an interesting delay today as a result primarily of the weather, but we are going to start, because we have quorum for witnesses and we do have a witness at the table.

There were some business items that I wished to discuss at the beginning of this meeting. However, given that we do have some delay with members coming by, we don't have a quorum to make decisions. Actually, I think we now have a quorum to make decisions.

[A voice]

Yes, we do.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

All right, we have a quorum to make decisions, so let me briefly go through some of the items that I want to quickly go over, so we can get to our witnesses as quickly as possible. Perhaps if we can deal with these issues, our other witnesses may show up. We've talked about most of the items before and most of them are simply a matter of course.

The committee budget needs to be adopted for witnesses' expenses for Bill C-16. Has that been circulated? We're going to circulate that right now. Clearly, I want some authority to adopt that budget.

While we're circulating that, as I mentioned a few days ago, a few meetings ago, we do have the return of the forms from the conflict of interest code that this committee set a subcommittee up for last year and did a fairly thorough job of reviewing. We now have the forms back and I'm suggesting that we set up a similar subcommittee to look at those forms and report back to the main committee. If members around the table agree that's the way to go, then I would be looking for a motion to create one. I did have the opportunity to talk to Mr. Reid yesterday, as Mr. Reid was the chair of that committee.

Mr. Reid, are you prepared to present a motion to set up a subcommittee to study those forms?

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Yes, Mr. Chair. I'm assuming that the committee would be in the same form as the previous committee, which is to say that we had.... Well, I guess we have to choose the four. By the time I was chair, we had one representative from each of the parties in addition, for a total, including myself, of five people.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Yes. I do have a motion here. Perhaps I could give it to you to read, Mr. Reid, because as chair I don't do motions. It is substantially the same as last year's motion.

This motion, colleagues, is in front of you, and it deals with setting up a subcommittee to review the revised forms, as directed by the subcommittee, and returned to us by the Ethics Commissioner.

Mr. Reid, please.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mysteriously, I've suddenly had three of these things come into my possession. At any rate, the motion reads as follows:

That a Subcommittee on the Conflict of Interest Code for Members of the House of Commons be created; that it be composed of five members, two from the Government party and one from each of the parties in opposition, to be named by the chair after the usual consultations with the whips; that a member from the government party be the chair of the subcommittee; and that the subcommittee be granted all of the powers of the committee pursuant to Standing Order 108(1) except the power to report directly to the House.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Is that acceptable?

Madam Redman, please.

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

My only question would be, is this in the usual form? Are these the parameters under which this subcommittee has operated on previous occasions?

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

My understanding is it's an identical motion to the one we set up last year. That would be my understanding.

Is that your understanding?

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. James M. Latimer]

Initially it was adopted, but then further on in the session you added.... Do you remember?

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Oh, that's correct.

[The Clerk]

That's why I've adapted—

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

It's been adapted, that's right, because later on in the session I went on that subcommittee as well. So the motion here has been adapted slightly from the original motion to allow the same thing to occur, that I would sit on that subcommittee as well. That's the only change, Madam Redman.

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Okay. Can you remind me, why was that adaptation...? I'm not objecting—

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Why was I added? Only because we started out that study as the main committee, so I had done a tremendous amount of research on the issue, on the code, on the forms. When it looked like it was going to be too big a deal for the main committee to handle with the workload we had, we developed a subcommittee. I thought, after a couple of weeks, that I had a lot to offer, so I volunteered to be on the committee. As a result, I was put on the committee.

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I think it's probably acceptable, because anything the subcommittee would come up with comes back to the main committee anyway.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Absolutely. The idea with any subcommittee is that they report back to the main committee, and then we can adopt or deal with it at that point.

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I commend you for having that amount of interest in this riveting topic, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

I have no other hobbies.

(Motion agreed to)

Colleagues, can we move back to the first item? I'm trying to move a little bit quicker so we can get to our witnesses.

On the committee budget, is there a motion to adopt the budget for witnesses' expenses? Moved by Madame Robillard.

(Motion agreed to) [See Minutes of Proceedings]

I have some good and bad news. Last Tuesday I mentioned to you that the Chief Electoral Officer of Quebec, Monsieur Blanchet, would be willing to appear on Tuesday. Unfortunately, he's called to say he's not available. He has cancelled, unavoidably and with great apology. He is not available at all next week. So there were some options, and I'll just lay them on the floor for the committee.

I spoke to the minister about legislation that's coming up. The minister has a very tight schedule but has offered to come on Tuesday to deal with the next two bills, which are veiled voting and rural voting.

We could move to clause-by-clause on Bill C-16 on Tuesday, but I was concerned about the members not being able to hear those witnesses. I think more witnesses were offered.

Did you get another list of witnesses for Bill C-16?

[The Clerk]

I received two names this morning.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

All right. We do have some other requests for witnesses on Bill C-16, so it may appear that the committee wishes to....

Mr. Lukiwski.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

I'd like to speak to your suggestions, if I may, and maybe prior to that I would like to bring to the attention of all of the members the significance of today's date. The significance is, of course, it's one day closer to the Saskatchewan Roughriders winning the Grey Cup.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you very much. What's your question?

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

If the witnesses cannot appear and other members of the committee want to be able to have an opportunity to question the witnesses, then I would suggest, particularly if you're saying that the minister would be available on Tuesday to speak to two other pieces of legislation that are coming forward and that we have to deal with anyway, we just bring the minister in and start examination of those two pieces of legislation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

That's fine. Let's deal with this one point at a time.

We've had the request for more witnesses and I am concerned that we're not able to hear Monsieur Blanchet. So it is the suggestion of the chair that we do not move to clause-by-clause--that's the first thing I'm going to suggest--but that we wait and hear those other witnesses. That would be my suggestion, and on Tuesday we hear from the minister and just juggle things.

Madame Robillard.