Evidence of meeting #129 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 information.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Noon
Glen Motz Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, CPC
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you, Minister and officials, for being here today.
Just so you are aware, Mr. Minister, the comments of Mr. Bittle don't reflect my testimony on Tuesday. I did not suggest for a moment that there was any nefarious plan, or a wilful intent, or a “conspiracy”, as the word has been used by Mr. Bittle. Those are his words. Those words did not emanate from me.
The concern that was raised to me by the public was about the confusion it caused. It was confusing. There was legislation proposed to government, which was being studied—at that time at the committee level—and then an agency you are responsible for, the RCMP, put out proactive communication, which is appropriate. However, it's that no one from your department would have any sort of mechanism whereby direction would be given to the RCMP to ensure that the language was appropriate. That's the concern.
You answered definitively that no one from your office that you're aware of—from Public Safety—provided any direction to the RCMP to proceed this way or on what language to use. That was your testimony, and I believe, to the best of your knowledge, that's not what happened.
With the bills that come through your department, is there a mechanism now that has cautions in place, that has the opportunity...so that the role of Parliament isn't presumed in proposed legislation? Because that's exactly what happened here. As acknowledged, there were individuals who were under the belief that now this was the law. That was because of the language that was being used.
I am curious. This committee is charged with the responsibility to ensure—as you've requested of them—that this doesn't happen again, and to provide a mechanism whereby that doesn't happen again.
Do you employ anything in your department to ensure that the public servants within your service understand the role of Parliament and that of the departments that answer to you?
Noon
Liberal
Ralph Goodale Liberal Regina—Wascana, SK
Mr. Motz, I'm seized of that very issue right now and thinking my way through it.
There probably does need to be standing advice—and this committee may offer some input into that—that goes from the minister to all agencies under their jurisdiction, which reminds their communications sections in particular that when they are communicating to the public with respect to legislation that is in process but not yet done, they need to make that point abundantly clear. There may even be a suggestion of a form of words that they need to use in every case to make that clear to the public.
We'll probably have to renew that advisory every now and then to make sure that it's current.
Noon
Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, CPC
Fair enough.
You indicated in your opening remarks, sir, that this was not the first time that something like this has happened, regardless of political persuasion. All parties have been responsible for it.
In those circumstances, is it possible that public servants—especially in cases of majorities—are completely unaware in some circumstances of the role of Parliament? The presumption from public servants could be that the legislation that's proposed could be as is, without amendment, long before it becomes law.
Is there an educational component that needs to occur here rather than just guidance?
Noon
Liberal
Ralph Goodale Liberal Regina—Wascana, SK
I think it would be useful for the communication sections of ministers' offices, but also for departments and agencies, to be reminded of the legislative prerogatives of Parliament, and that a law isn't a law until royal assent happens. And that follows all of the House of Commons and the Senate having their say and making the determination.
There are in our process, as you know, some examples where it works the other way around. On a ways and means motion, for example, once the Minister of Finance stands in the House and tables a ways and means motion, even before the legislation is introduced and ultimately passed, the convention under our system is that the Department of Finance functions on the basis of the ways and means motion having been accepted.
12:05 p.m.
Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, CPC
I'll have to take your word for it, because I'm certainly no—
12:05 p.m.
Liberal
Ralph Goodale Liberal Regina—Wascana, SK
There are examples where it goes both ways, but clarity is a very good thing. We should try to get it.
12:05 p.m.
Liberal
12:05 p.m.
Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, CPC
From the very beginning, the issue for me was never about the legislation itself, but about the breach of the process. The whole intent behind this is to ensure that—and there could be a multitude of other ones that have happened—there is no presumption. The committee is charged with doing that.
This is the bill that it happened on. The hope is that it doesn't happen again.
12:05 p.m.
Liberal
Ralph Goodale Liberal Regina—Wascana, SK
My hope is exactly the same, Mr. Motz. I hope that we can develop the kind of safeguard mechanisms in the communications process to make sure that the legislative prerogatives of the Parliament of Canada are always known, understood and respected.
12:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Thank you, everyone, for a very positive and constructive first hour.
We'll suspend for a couple of minutes and then come back.
12:18 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Good afternoon. Welcome back to the 129th meeting of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.
This meeting is being held in public. It's great to have Deputy Commissioner Strachan back with Mr. O'Reilly.
I understand that you didn't have any opening comments. Do you have any more comments?
12:18 p.m.
D/Commr Jennifer Strachan
No, I'm ready to go.
Whatever you have to ask, hopefully we can give you the answers you're looking for.
12:18 p.m.
Liberal
David Graham Liberal Laurentides—Labelle, QC
Thank you.
The RCMP's website has—I checked online—about a 100,000 pages. Is that right? What's the process for maintaining and editing those pages? How much oversight is there...how independent are the communications teams? Can you make sense of that?
12:18 p.m.
D/Commr Jennifer Strachan
My previous experience has been that they try to keep it updated. I would suggest to you that even coming into this program, it was one of the first things I did. I'm recognizing that some of the material on the various programs that I work for and with is not up to date. There is a continuous evolution to try to stay on top of changing material.
We have a national communications program that takes care of the strategic side. Then the individual programs have their own sort of tactical communications employees.
Yes, there is a ton of web content. I would suggest to you that we need to be a little bit more forward-leaning—I'm speaking on behalf of another area of my organization—in bringing some of that content down.
You're right. There is a lot of content there.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
David Graham Liberal Laurentides—Labelle, QC
On an average page being edited, how high up in management actually approves the final content, as opposed to the intent?
12:20 p.m.
D/Commr Jennifer Strachan
I can't speak for other programs.
In some of my past experience, depending on what the content was, there would be various levels of oversight. In this case, it rested with the firearms program at that time.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
David Graham Liberal Laurentides—Labelle, QC
Would that go all the way up to asking the deputy commissioner to approve this wording?
12:20 p.m.
D/Commr Jennifer Strachan
In this case, it did not.
