Evidence of meeting #120 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 point.
A recording is available from Parliament.
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Good afternoon, and welcome to the 120th meeting of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.
Mr. Bittle.
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.
I'd like to thank the minister for being here, and I apologize for interrupting before we begin, but we did have an agreement with the Conservatives that the minister would appear prior to clause-by-clause proceeding. We have a motion before this committee that needs to be finalized. It needs to be voted on, and I think we should take a moment. It won't take long. We've debated it all week.
The Conservatives have been ragging the puck. It's like a bad episode from the movie Groundhog Day, time after time, delay after delay, to prevent clause-by-clause from starting. The Canadian people want to see us bring this forward.
The CEO of Elections Canada said that this is a good bill. He said it's not a perfect bill, so let's get to clause-by-clause and make this bill better.
We have a motion before the committee. I don't want to take up any more time, but I think we should vote on that bill and get clause-by-clause started, and have a date set for the beginning and the end, and then we can quickly proceed to questioning the minister.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Sorry, Mr. Chair. Am I mistaken about this? I think, and I might be mistaken, that procedurally this is not the same meeting.
I'm not sure if Mr. Bittle is moving a new motion that we not hear from the minister but instead move to the motion that was before the committee, or perhaps he is moving that we withdraw that motion. Procedurally, I'm just not sure how it works.
This meeting was not called to deal with that issue, the issue of the motion. It was called to hear from the minister. There was a separate meeting this morning, which has adjourned, and we had a discussion at the committee about calling a new meeting following this one, at which the minister would appear, at which we would deal with Ms. Sahota's motion, to which Mr. Nater had made an amendment. It seems to me that it's procedurally out of order to simply assert that we should be on that now. Although, as I say, it may be procedurally acceptable for Mr. Bittle to move such a motion.
I will just editorially say it strikes me as being bad form to do that, at this time. That's just an editorial, but I would like my procedural question answered.
3:35 p.m.
David Christopherson Hamilton Centre, NDP
Can I get a ruling on the question, please? There's no sense in my arguing something that I may have already won depending on the ruling. If you don't mind, I'll wait.
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Okay, the clerk tells me that Mr. Reid is somewhat in order, but Mr. Bittle could propose a motion that we move onto discussion of the other motion. It's not debatable, and if that passed then we would move onto the discussion he's having.
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
Then I propose we do that, followed by having the minister speak.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Could we have a recorded vote on this one, Chair?
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Mr. Chair, I believe I am correct in assuming that at this point we are once again back to discussing not the motion but the amendment to the motion.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Okay.
Are we at a point in the proceedings where I could speak to the amendment to the motion? Am I right that the speaking order was established? I guess it's only a convention, a best practice, that we—
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Right, in fact the speaking order that we had is gone and we don't go back to it. I think that's right.
I'm just trying to work out what it is, that's all.
3:40 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Look, Mr. Chair, it's unfortunate that we're in the middle of a procedural discussion that we all assumed would be suspended for an hour while we heard from the minister.
This is a strong-arm tactic to keep us.... I'm not sure whether the government's point is that they don't want the minister to speak, or whether they want to teach us a lesson: You don't get to hear from the minister unless you just collapse like a house of cards. This is actually an offensive tactic.
If we have to, we can talk for some length of time and we can reschedule the minister's appointment.
I'm just going to take a moment to get out Ms. Sahota's motion, and I'm going to make a suggestion here. We're, of course, discussing the amendment to Ms. Sahota's motion.
3:40 p.m.
Hamilton Centre, NDP
On a point of order, Mr. Chair, could I, with respect, ask Mr. Reid if he would accept a Simms protocol question?
3:40 p.m.
Hamilton Centre, NDP
Do you have any interest, and would it be helpful, if we agreed to flip the discussion, assuming that we're all wanting to do this? That's my assumption. We'll see.
Do we maybe want to hear from the minister, spend that time—because you rightly point out we could lose that—and flip this discussion to the hour after the minister is done?
I see some government members shaking their heads. You're going to have to give me a good reason why that's not a good idea, or I'm going to have to be concerned that Mr. Reid has a valid point and that you're playing some kind of game.
I don't think so. I didn't see it that way. I was part of agreeing to this, but I'm just offering this up because I think a valid point is being made. We could accomplish both by hearing from the minister now and then upon that adjournment, agreeing to spend another half-hour or hour to get that motion passed so that we can get on to the work.
3:40 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
I'm willing if we stick with the whole Simms protocol idea.
I don't know if the minister is familiar with the Simms protocol, but it was a good idea developed by Mr. Simms on a previous occasion.
I won't dwell on it but the question is, under the Simms protocol, can we get some feedback from the Liberals, without my ceding the floor, as to how they would feel about what Mr. Christopherson is suggesting?
September 27th, 2018 / 3:40 p.m.
Liberal
Ruby Sahota Liberal Brampton North, ON
Mr. Christopherson, I understand where you're coming from, but where we're coming from is not from a place of wanting to delay this anymore. It's coming from a place of wanting to move forward.
We've been debating this motion, to begin clause-by-clause essentially, for some time—two full meetings. We could continue to do this after the minister speaks, but I'm afraid that we could continue to do this for several more meetings without ever getting to a point where we actually begin clause-by-clause on this legislation, which both you and I agree is so important to democracy and to Canadians.
That's why I really feel it's necessary to get to the vote on the motion. You weren't here one day when Nathan was filling in for you, but there was a handshake agreement made at that point, basically to get the minister to agree to come, so that immediately after we would start into clause-by-clause. However, there have been no reassurances given at all that there's any intention on the other side to begin studying the actual legislation.
At this point it seems like we keep bringing witnesses forward and keep bowing down to every demand that the Conservatives make. We've been very lenient and flexible, but we're not seeing it reciprocated. We're waiting and looking for an indication that clause-by-clause will begin.