Procedure and House Affairs Committee on April 4th, 2019

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Then you have an issue with the number of rooms. Using the Sir John A. Macdonald Building resolves that issue of having a dedicated room, but you also need more time. I can see it being interrupted in a way that would throw its business off when we have the bells ringing all the time, as we sometimes do, more than it would throw off a normal committee.

[Charles Robert]

Let's say that becomes the reality. You could put in place that when any vote is called in the chamber, if it coincides with a schedule of the parallel chamber, the division bells would have to ring for, let's say, an extra 10 minutes.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Right.

[Charles Robert]

There are ways that you can make adjustments that recognize the reality of creating the second chamber.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Right. I agree.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Scott, just to help on that question, the researchers are going to present to us the number of physical seats in the other two chambers plus the average attendance, so we'll know what they use.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

That's very helpful.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

It's quite small, actually.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

I believe it.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

The quorum is three.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Well—

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Scot.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Through you, Mr. Chair, just because I'm the new guy, obviously, I have a couple of questions.

Based on the system they have in Australia and the U.K., and how they've set up their rules, did they have a cost structure they could present to you?

[Charles Robert]

I've not seen anything relating to that.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

I just wondered the cost to the taxpayers.

Also, the current chamber that we're in, couldn't we change, as some members were saying, the current structure of that and have a debate session currently? If someone said, in the new chamber, we'll schedule something at eight o'clock in the morning, people say that they don't have the time for that right now.

[Charles Robert]

It's possible. If you schedule the parallel chamber to meet out of times of the primary chamber, it would not be impossible. But that's what you would have to do. It would have to be quite a deliberate process.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Go ahead.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Linda.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

I think that the House leaders and the whips are important people to include in this discussion about what the possibilities and the implications are. I know they're challenged enough as it is making sure people show up to fill spots in committee, show up to a vote and be in the chamber to support people when they're speaking and so forth. It would probably be good to hear from them about what complications there might be for them or how we could take that into consideration.

I am deeply concerned about any proposal about spending more when we already have commitments, for example, to be coming up with the dollars to provide interpretation for indigenous and we're not doing that. For example, the committee I just came from agreed for the first time to translate their report into four languages. I think that these kinds of things are going to increase in cost. We need to be thinking about the commitments we've already made in the House of Commons and through committees before we start adding on and then ratcheting back.

Those kinds of factors are really important to look at. When we're looking at interpretation, we're now looking at more complications on things like that. I think costing clearly will be a big one that probably various leaders will ask for—certainly the Speaker's office and so forth.

Who is going to decide the agenda and what debates will occur? Is it going to be different from the way it is right now, which is essentially the majority of members at every committee? Different committees operate more convivially than others. Is this chamber going to be different, particularly if David is saying that it should give more opportunity to the backbenchers? There's a heck of a lot more backbenchers in the majority Liberal government right now than there was in the Conservative majority government.

Those kinds of things.... You'll have more enthusiasm in the members of Parliament if they think that is generally going to give them an opportunity to be debating.

This idea is coming, as I understand, from Samara. They did that report on the frustrations former members of Parliament had with democracy and so forth. Part of it, too, is that the public wants to hear more of what the various parties and members of Parliament think. I haven't really heard anybody talk about the role of the great unwashed public in this.

Is that room going to have to allow for substantial audiences? That is another issue because they can come and sit in on our debates in the House. They'll probably want to sit in on some of these debates, particularly if they recommend them.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Madam Lapointe.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for joining us today, Mr. Robert.

You piqued my curiosity earlier. I agree with Ms. Duncan that we don't have two minutes to ourselves. We start here in the morning and we never know when we finish. I was fortunate to sit in the National Assembly of Quebec, and I thought I was working hard there. We sat for three days, from noon to 2 p.m., and then we would stop. We did not eat at a committee table like we are here. We would really stop. Everything was in French. We would finish at 6:30 p.m. and sit for three days.

[Charles Robert]

Very civilized.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

I would say that the speeches are not always of higher quality. When I first came here, the first thing that came to mind was whether we were going to eat. I was hungry. No more jokes now. The legislative agenda was still moving forward.

We are talking about Australia and Great Britain. If I understood your comments correctly, countries that do not follow the Commonwealth or British model have not adopted a parallel chambers approach.

You also said that it is time to be innovative and that anything can be proposed.

[Charles Robert]

Absolutely. It depends on the will of this committee. You may decide to establish a parallel chamber, but with certain objectives. It is really up to you to determine what sort of parallel chamber you want. You can determine the hours of work based on the availability of MPs, which, as you said, is very limited.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

At the beginning of your presentation, you mentioned the 2016 briefing note on initiatives toward a family-friendly House of Commons. That's what you mentioned. You said that the way MPs represent their constituents has changed a little.