Evidence of meeting #78 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 million.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
It's the Thursday, in the second hour. The first hour would be the report with your alternate.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Is that okay?
My other question is more tricky. It's about the witnesses for the parties. I would assume we would have five parties, or how many?
Conservative, Liberal, NDP, Bloc, and Green are the ones that I would think would be interested, but it's up to the committee.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
It's funny you say that, because I was thinking something completely different. My thought was that the first thing we would do is ask our analyst to do an environmental scan, to take a look at other mature democracies that have created such an entity and what their thinking was and what they came up with, just to help us reinvent the wheel.
Quite frankly, I would like to be hearing from parliamentary experts too, not just the parties in terms of what they want.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
No. We're going to hear from a whole pile of witnesses, because you're putting in your witness list.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
Yes. It's just because it's a time constraint. It's to get the first meeting going.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Larry Bagnell
How many parties? Is there anyone who objects to having the five parties present?
NDP
Liberal
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
—the three, and then there would be Ms. May for the Greens. I think there would be an argument about whether or not there's another independent or whether she represents the independents.
In the model that we used for the previous parliamentary review of the Chief Electoral Officer, we had a formula. Can you remember what that was? Whatever it was, it was deemed to be fair by everybody.
Go ahead, Andre.
Andre Barnes Committee Researcher
I stand to be corrected, but I believe the study was on the Board of Internal Economy and that part of the motion was to involve a rotating independent member. It was to be determined between the independents who was to show up for each meeting.
Liberal
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
I know, but it matters a lot to those folks, and we need to be fair-minded.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
As witnesses, you're asking whether we should have a witness from each of the three parties that have party status, as well as the Greens and the Bloc. I personally would say yes to that.