Evidence of meeting #105 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was monday.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:35 p.m.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Yes, but there are two different witness lists that we're talking about. There is one where they are the easy, obvious ones.
12:35 p.m.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
For the obvious ones, I think Nathan was saying that we could even do them by tomorrow, but I'm talking about the full.... The full list is what you were saying for next week, Blake, right?
12:35 p.m.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Yes, exactly.
I was suggesting that for maybe this time next week; I think the end of the weekend is probably too soon. It's a pretty big bill. There are a lot of different subject matters in it, obviously.
12:35 p.m.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
On Tuesday we have a meeting. Maybe at that meeting we're given the witness lists...?
No, we don't have one?
12:35 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
The back row said “no” so I think that might be a no. They look pretty smart.
How about a modification—not to complicate this—where we aim for the three stages? One is the obvious folks for early next week. Ruby's suggestion was shot down, but maybe have an initial draft of lists from the parties, but the witness list invitation stays open until next Friday to accommodate further thoughts. Sometimes what happens, Chair, as you know, is you hear from the minister or the Chief Electoral Officer on a bill like this, and then other witnesses, other ideas come to mind that we hadn't thought of because of the testimony that we hear.
The initial list is the most obvious folks. The second one...by Tuesday or Wednesday of next week. Yet we as a committee agree that there are still additions that we could make by the end of next week to accommodate some of the maybe less obvious ones based on the testimony we hear.
12:35 p.m.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
I think it's just putting it out there. I like the direction that we're going in. I'd like to have as many witnesses as we can as soon as possible, given what Nathan has discussed in terms of getting this back to the House, and be as thorough as possible.
I'll throw this out immediately. I know the minister is available on Monday after question period, from 3:30 to 4:30. The department officials can be made available, depending on what the committee wants, for an additional hour or two after that, if that can be agreed to right off the bat.
12:35 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
To state the obvious, we don't need them on this. Are you suggesting a special meeting?
12:35 p.m.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
Yes. There will probably have to be more than one special meeting.
12:35 p.m.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Certainly in order to give it a proper study, there probably is going to be a need for something far beyond what we have available to us here in the next couple of weeks. Although I'm comfortable with the idea of doing something like that on a Monday with the minister, I would argue that with a bill of this size the minister should certainly be available for more than one hour at the committee. If we're talking about having a meeting, she should accompany her officials and be available for the entirety of that meeting, because it is a very comprehensive piece of legislation. One hour would essentially allow, in one of the party's cases, seven minutes for them to ask the minister who is responsible for the bill, about a 350-page bill, which to me seems entirely unreasonable. Certainly that should be expanded; I'm comfortable with that.
I think to go beyond that, the idea that we're starting to talk about scheduling this here or that there, we haven't even made a determination as to what this study looks like, its length and size, the amount of time that we're going to give to this. The minister is an obvious one, but to start to go beyond that type of a witness, let's get a sense of what we're talking about here in terms of the scope and length of the study.
I have not heard anything put forward in terms of what we're talking about here other than some backroom chatter that's been out there that the government is really trying to force this through as quickly as they can, and that they want to just do a few meetings and get it over with and hope that no one complains. I can tell them that we are certainly not going to be onside with that, nor certainly are Canadians. I think we need to get a sense of that before we go any further on it.
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Perhaps we could just finish the thing on the minister because Nathan is still in the middle of his presentation on that whole scope.
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
In terms of the minister, I appreciate what the Conservatives are bringing forward on this. They are correct that this is a big bill. The counter proposal, which may make more sense and not split the testimony, is to have the minister come immediately with department officials. Make it one hour with the minister and two hours with the officials. Then have the minister come back before clause-by-clause for an additional hour, which provides you with the two hours. Then you can hear from all of the expert witnesses and then question the minister again, and have a bookend during the process.
12:40 p.m.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Again, we're starting to try to put the cart before the horse to some degree here as well.
12:40 p.m.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Although I appreciate that suggestion, let's get a sense as to what we're talking about here.
I appreciate that Mr. Cullen has the floor, but I'd love to hear what the government's thoughts are on this. They're the ones who are going to make the decision. Mr. Cullen might have a proposal—I don't know—but it's the government who will determine with the votes they have on this committee whether they're going to try to ram this down the throats of the opposition, and therefore Canadians, or whether they're not. I think that will determine a lot of what's acceptable and what's not. If they're going to try to legitimately work to allow there to be proper debate of this....
I mean, we listened in the House of Commons yesterday to the minister when they moved time allocation on this, which, I will point out, they moved notice to do after one hour of debate in the House of Commons. Then we listened over and over throughout the little half hour we got to question the government's move to do this, as the minister claimed that we should let's get this to committee and we can have this great debate, this huge, very full debate on this 350-page piece of legislation.
I want to know whether those words were simply hollow words, as we've heard before from this government, or whether they were actually a legitimate, serious intention to actually have a full and proper debate here in this committee, where we can discuss in detail the 350 pages of the bill and the many changes the bill makes to our elections law. Keep in mind that our elections law is what governs the makeup of the House of Commons. It determines who represents their fellow Canadians in the House of Commons, which therefore makes it probably as important a piece of legislation as we would ever deal with.
We heard these words and this idea that somehow their forcing time allocation and not having debate in the House of Commons.... A number of members of Parliament who wanted to speak to this legislation on behalf of their constituents were denied the opportunity because of that move. The entirety of the response from the Minister of Democratic Institutions was to say, well, they're going to provide that opportunity in committee. I guess the question is this: Will they keep to their word on that, unlike just about everything else they've ever said? Will they allow there to be that proper debate in this committee and allow members of Parliament to dig into the details of this bill, hear from witnesses who can provide us thoughts on that and then question the minister, or will they not?
That will be determining a lot of what we do here. I mean, to start talking about slotting this hour here, and that hour there....
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Okay. I had interrupted Mr. Cullen to try to get that one point covered. The floor is Mr. Cullen's if he wants it, based on what he's heard so far.
12:40 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I hear Blake's concerns in terms of the public message or rhetoric matching the actions. Governments always say they want to work with you as they invoke time allocation. Some of my blue team colleagues down the row would know that, too.
I'm just looking for what would work. I hear the offer from Chris with respect to the minister up front and then the minister at the back. It gets to the two hours, except that it may be a middle ground. It seems possible to me that, in some ways, it could be more effective, just in that, by the second time, we will have heard criticisms of the bill, where the holes are, and then we could call the minister back and ask, “Did you think about this? Did you think about that?”
We had early confusion, if you remember, Mr. Chair. It was Scott who was asked to introduce it as the interim minister, so you can forgive it a bit, but even through the technical briefings that some of us —not many—went to, from the public servant side of things, there were major questions that they either didn't have the answers to or gave us incorrect information.
Parties issuing receipts and needing to issue receipts before they could get reimbursed from Elections Canada was a major part of the bill that we asked Scott about. He said, “You can amend it.” A few days went by, and then he said, “It's actually in the bill”. That type of stuff does not give me as a parliamentarian a huge amount of confidence that this is locked, has been well considered, and is totally airtight. I think we're going to find either by intention or by not paying attention that there are problems with the bill.
I'm still pushing for travel. I understand the tight timelines, but again, my grandmother used to say that a lack of planning on my part did not make for a crisis on her part. As a little kid, I wasn't a great planner.
This is what I was going to propose. We hit the thing hard starting next week. I look at our totals as a way to think about these committee studies. How many hours can you fit in to start to satisfy what would seem like a worthwhile...? Frankly, this has been so late. It's not even going to meet the standard that we took with Bill C-23, the Fair Elections Act. It's not going to meet the same number of hours of study, which, as I have said, is unfortunate, because I think it's a bigger bill than Bill C-23 was. We could argue whether it's as good, more damaging, or whatnot.
We've lost two hours of committee time for next week through other things. If we were to do two hours on the Monday, get an hour on Tuesday, do another two hours either Tuesday or Wednesday, and then get another hour on Thursday, that would give us six, maybe. That would be my proposal for next week. That's the “get the ball rolling” week.
The next week I'm going to propose we travel.
12:45 p.m.
NDP
12:45 p.m.
Conservative
12:45 p.m.
Conservative
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
What you're talking about on Monday would be the time that has been offered with the minister and the officials. Is that what I'm hearing?
12:45 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Yes, one hour with the a minister and an hour with officials.
I'll start to get really specific, just as a way to throw something out, Mr. Chair, to give us something to talk about, but I'm not wedded to this.
I suggest an hour with the minister and an hour with officials on Monday. We have the first hour lost on Tuesday. We have the second hour with Elections Canada, who should be available, and do a second session either Tuesday evening or Wednesday afternoon. Then we get into some of the other more obvious witnesses, and then a sixth hour—this will be the sixth hour by now—on that second hour on Thursday. The first hour is for the indigenous languages report, and the second hour would be available. That's the first week.
The second week I'm going to suggest we travel, although I have great hesitation. A week of travel in a country the size of Canada.... Ruby and I, and others, have done national tours. You can't do the east coast in a week sometimes.
12:45 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
We leave, I assume, the Sunday before and arrive back on the Saturday after.