Procedure and House Affairs Committee on April 21st, 2020

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

As a person who comes from a more rural riding, I think that if we talk about this as a process that we could potentially slide into if we were required to, whether for a pandemic or for something else that was happening, one of the challenges would be Internet accessibility, and that depends on where I am. There are multiple airports in my riding, for example, that do not have good access to the Internet. I'm wondering whether, within this process, there will be an assessment done of which MPs could have problems or concerns with Internet accessibility. It certainly would make my constituents happy to have that officially on the record, because they live with this a lot more frequently than I do since I live in one of the bigger communities.

[Charles Robert]

It's my understanding that that's a concern for IT right now.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

All right. So we will be able to identify which ridings are having that concern.

[Charles Robert]

Absolutely.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Okay. Can that come back to the committee?

[Charles Robert]

I suppose once we've collected the data, there would be no reason why we couldn't share it.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you. That would be really helpful.

I have another question. There are multiple platforms that deliver these types of services, so I'm wondering why we're using Zoom.

[Charles Robert]

I think there might be several reasons. Perhaps one is adaptability to security. The other thing is, for one, that it allows for the floor and two languages, and since we are obliged to be bilingual, we have to have three channels—English, French and floor.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Was it the only application that would operate in that way?

[Charles Robert]

I know there are some that do not. I'm not sure if there are others besides Zoom that provide this capacity or capability.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you so much.

We've heard a lot about constitutional concerns. The one part that stuck with me is the need to have 20 sitting in the House to have quorum. There was discussion that there might be ways to do that electronically or virtually. I'm wondering if you could talk a bit about what constitutional concerns we as members should be worried about and what that could look like. Again, I'm going back to the part about having the ability to slide into this again if we need to. I just want to be clear about how easy that transition would be or what challenges members would face in that area.

[Charles Robert]

I think that's really a question that Philippe would probably be better qualified to answer.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Sure.

[Philippe Dufresne]

I would say that it's important that if this committee recommends this and the House decides to go in the direction of accepting virtual presence for the purposes of quorum, it would really require identifying how that's going to be done and how secure that's going to be, and making it clear that the decision was being made on the basis of the constitutional requirement for a quorum of 20. The House is putting in place mechanisms so that those present virtually or otherwise will be considered to be present for the purpose of that quorum. It would really be important to make that part of the House's procedural decisions and the way it is implementing the requirements of the Constitution.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

When we talk about the process of being able to slip into this, one of the things that have impacted me and my constituents the most has been the process of adapting to a very new reality. A lot of businesses have talked to me about planning ahead for this kind of event to happen again or something like that, so if we're talking about slipping into this system, I'm curious: What would be the method for doing that? I hope somebody can answer that. Would we have modified standing orders on the side that we could slip into? How would we make that decision? We've heard that when we change the Standing Orders, we want everybody to agree, so would there have to be a preliminary meeting at which all the members could be present?

I'm just trying to understand the process.

[Charles Robert]

I think that's really something the committee has an opportunity to look at. Within the narrow frame of your May 15 meeting, that might be a bit difficult, but the experience you are acquiring, even in preparing for this report, might give you some insight as to how this should be handled.

Today, in the motions that have been adopted by the House, the Speaker consults and the whips of the recognized parties have a role in determining how and when the House should come back. That, too, might provide some type of model.

It's not impossible to have, as a lay-aside, specific standing orders that would apply for a virtual environment that could kick in, and everyone would know what those standing orders are and how they would apply, as a reserve for when we go into a virtual environment; otherwise, we stick with the normal method of doing things that we are accustomed to.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Right. Thank you so much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

Thank you, Mr. Robert.

At this point, I want to check the pulse of the committee as to whether you'd want to get into the five-minute round of questioning. I know there was some desire to continue questioning, but we are left with only 30 minutes for committee business and we do need to get through our witness list and work plan.

Is there any feedback?

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Madam Chair, I have a couple of questions I'd like to ask, if that's okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

Okay.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Chair, I do as well.

[Corey Tochor, Conservative, Saskatoon—University, SK]

I would like to ask a question, too.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

All right. We'll carry into the five-minute round, and that's all we're going to have time for. That might leave us with 15 minutes for committee business. I am really hoping for some co-operation to get through the committee business as quickly as possible, because we don't have a lot of flexibility past two o'clock.

Monsieur Brassard, please carry on.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I want to pick up on the theme that Mr. Robert just ended up on. We need to step back here and realize that what we are looking at is a temporary measure of a virtual Parliament. As Mr. Robert said, we can have some foresight as to what mechanisms kick in, or what circumstances kick in, on a virtual Parliament going forward. However, right now, as it stands, we are dealing with this issue at the height of a health crisis.

I'll remind all committee members as well that there are essential workers who are putting themselves on the front line every single day across this country. There is talk about reopening economies in every single province. There's talk about opening golf courses, for God's sake.

Mr. Dufresne, my question is in relation to what you said earlier about the Constitution, that it is a living tree and that it does adapt to modern life. How would the courts interpret “modern life” as it relates to the Constitution?

Again, I want to re-emphasize that, by all accounts, we are in a temporary health crisis that will subside at some point and we're going to get back to normal life. Therefore, what would the courts interpret as “modern life”, and how would that be applied when it comes to changing the Constitution and the requirements of Parliament as you stated earlier?

[Philippe Dufresne]

Thank you, Mr. Brassard.

Changing the Constitution itself is an option. That is something that could be done, but it requires a decision of Parliament as a whole. If you change the Constitution, you amend it and you can say for greater certainty that virtual presence is considered presence. That's one option.

The other option, in terms of interpretation, is to say that the Constitution requires the presence of 20 members. Can virtual presence be acceptable by the House as presence for those purposes? Under a living-tree, modern interpretation, the argument would be that, in modern times, teleconference and video conference, these types of tools, are used and can be used to indicate one's presence and participation at a meeting. While that would not have been acceptable in the initial view of the Constitution, obviously in modern times it can be.

The other element that could be relevant is the presence of this emergency health crisis. There is also the point I made about interpreting the Constitution in a way that makes sense in terms of its internal architecture and the principle of democracy: Is it necessary for democracy to function and for the House to function during a pandemic to have some flexibility about how it operates? That would be something that would be relevant in that discussion.