Procedure and House Affairs Committee on March 21st, 2017

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

It was concerning being able to take the floor from anywhere. He'd still have his own seat.

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

Oh, I see what you're saying. Okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

They're running in and out and all over the place to talk to people.

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

That's an interesting thought. I genuinely don't know. I've never seen the proceedings of the—

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

On a point of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Monsieur Dubé.

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm sorry for interrupting my colleague, but I want to verify the facts before raising this issue.

Earlier, we talked about the different behaviour that could result in the Speaker punishing members. I remember the case of Stéphan Tremblay, a Bloc Québécois member, who actually removed his seat from the House. He climbed into a van at the entrance to Parliament and left with the seat.

I'm drawing your attention to the matter because, as part of the discussion on the procedures and the behaviour of members, it's very important to be fair to all the parties. The Bloc Québécois also had its moment of glory in that regard. The incident left Gilles Duceppe and Denis Coderre speechless, which is difficult to do in the case of those two men.

I simply want to add this point to what my colleague said earlier. I don't want to keep discussing the matter, because I know my colleague has moved on to another topic.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

That's very interesting. Thank you.

Mr. Reid.

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

My head is now filled with the implications of having the House leader move around physically and the way one would deal with that.

I was going to say that I've never seen the House of Commons in Westminster except on television, and so I don't know how they do it. They have benches and no assigned seating. I don't know how—

What was that?

[Arnold Chan, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

They don't have benches. You can take a seat.

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

I know that, but I haven't seen how they deal with people speaking.

In New Zealand and Australia, they have a similar.... I have seen them in operation. They have benches instead of seats, or instead of desks. At least for the front bench in Australia they do. They actually have desks for those who are further back. I don't know how they deal with that. I think you have to have a more informal method of catching the Speaker's eye when you want to ask a question. That is my guess. I don't know.

For voting, they deal with it in Britain by just saying that you have to walk through a door. You get counted when you go through a door. That's their way of dealing with it, and they have to deal with the other MPs who are in a different room as well.

Those are problems that are not ours, but that leads me to the next item, which is:

We will look at other ways to make Question Period more relevant, including the use of online technologies, and will work with all parties to recommend and bring about these changes.

To make the obvious point here, I don't think it would be legitimate for the minister to be saying, “We won't let the other parties have a veto on this part of our election platform when it was explicit that we would work with the parties to recommend and bring about the changes.”

For what it's worth, I don't think that's the sort of thing anyone would want to act on unilaterally anyway. I could be wrong, but it strikes me that there is a specific mention of online technologies.

When I first read this, I thought, oh, electronic voting. I'm also not sure that requires a change to the Standing Orders either, to be honest. It might be helpful, but I'm not sure it's essential. If no one challenges the legality of a vote that takes place by means of people pressing a button on their desk, then I suspect it would simply become the way we do things, although I would want to get an opinion on that first.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

We can say goodbye to our intrepid reporter.

You didn't want us to suspend while you were gone, did you?

[A voice]

No.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Then we can carry on?

[A voice]

I'll still be listening.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Okay.

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

Mr. Chair, I know we have to suspend the formal part of the meeting, but would it be possible to have an update on the Austrians from our analyst? I'm worried we wont have a chance to....

Do you have any information?

[Andre Barnes]

Mr. Reid, if we suspend I can come around and give you an update, if that's okay.

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

Yes, that will be fine.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

As required by the Standing Orders, we are suspended until after the vote.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

You don't have to rush, because I'm going to unsuspend, and then I'm going to immediately suspend again for the Austrian thing so I can start the preparations as suggested by Mr. Reid.

We will suspend first of all to hear from the Austrian delegation, and for question period we'll suspend until 3:30 p.m. to give people time to get back, because question period doesn't usually end until about 3:15 p.m.

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

Mr. Chair, is the meeting with the Austrians one of our informal ones?

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Yes, it's totally informal. There are no minutes.

[The Clerk]

We're turning off the cameras.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

The cameras are off.