Procedure and House Affairs Committee on May 13th, 2020

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

On a point of order, Madam Chair, who has the floor?

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

I wasn't finished what I was saying. I used the words “irrational fear”, and I don't think that's disrespectful. That's my perception. I think part of my parliamentary privilege is to express myself, and that's exactly what I am doing here.

I want to continue with my point. In our report, the Conservatives asked specifically for an account and overview of all of the provincial legislatures. From my perspective, based on the briefing note we were given, there was all kinds of other information.

You're saying that I'm cherry-picking, and you're asking for information, but in the report it's not reflected currently that New Zealand, the EU Parliament, Brazil, France, Spain—all of them—have moved towards remote or electronic voting of some kind. Some of them have also adopted proxy voting. I even went back and looked at Hansard late last night. In the blues for meeting 13, Siwan Davies from the National Assembly for Wales talked about how they had moved to weighted voting but also electronic voting.

I think the vast majority of national legislatures have moved towards some form of remote or electronic voting. I think we should be doing the same.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

Next up is Madam Normandin, and then Mr. Gerretsen.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

One of the points that were raised is that we don't know how long this pandemic will last. So we don't know how long everyone's parliamentary privilege will be violated. In fact, the right to vote, including against our party occasionally or freely on certain issues, is one of the parliamentary privileges. Not everything can be done through a block vote or by proxy. My understanding of the hybrid formula is that only members on site could exercise that parliamentary privilege, and those who remain in remote regions could not.

I want to remind you that our recommendation says that this would require a secure electronic voting system, as we will not recommend that just any voting system be used. I think this would fall under the NPD 3 recommendation, whereby any new way to proceed would first be approved by recognized parties before the voting method in the House is changed. Once we have found an adequate voting system, the recognized parties would need to give their consent.

It seems to me that there is still a process leading to the implementation of a new secure voting method. So I don't see why all members could not fully exercise their parliamentary privileges.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

Next is Mr. Gerretsen, and then maybe we can vote.

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

I just wanted to say hi and let you know that I'm here and that I'm taking over for my substitute. I've arrived back from Ottawa. I see that you have been going at it for a while. It's great to be back. I'm looking forward to my first vote. I hope that can happen really soon.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

Yes. You joined us, I think, from the lobby of the House of Commons in Ottawa earlier. It looked like a lobby room or something. Welcome back.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

We're halfway done.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

Yes, we're almost there. We're halfway done.

Mr. Genuis, are you subbing in now for Mr. Brassard?

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I'm not subbing in. I'm at the table. Am I allowed to make a comment in that context?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

My goodness, we've had so many comments. I'm very lenient. Can you make a 30-second comment?

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I'm not capable of that, but I'll try to make it 60 seconds. How's that?

Madam Chair, Eric will correct me if I'm wrong on this, but my understanding is that in the British House of Commons, for instance, they do in-person voting, but they have an in-person voting system that doesn't require every member to be in the chamber at the same time. They have a process of in-person voting that involves a rotation through the lobbies, or something like that. We could very much envision a voting system that addresses some of the very real security concerns that have been raised involving in-person voting while still respecting public health guidelines. That would go in a bit of a different direction from this recommendation.

In particular, in Canada, our institutions are more vulnerable to staff members voting and proxy voting, and I think that would be a bad thing in terms of the independence we expect from members. I think we have to be sensitive to that if we're concerned about the rights and privileges of members, so I would put that out there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

We've had a lot of debate on this issue. I think our support staff and everyone are exhausted. We're almost at the end. Some of the recommendations that come after this have already been dealt with, so there's not much more. I hope that I can call a vote on this matter.

Would you like to vote on this?

Okay, we'll have a recorded vote, Mr. Clerk.

[Andre Barnes]

Madam Chair, as a technical amendment to the recommendation, it should probably read “House of Commons” as opposed to “Parliament”, as Parliament includes both the Senate and the House.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

Absolutely. That was a good catch. We can only make recommendations for the House of Commons, so that change will be reflected. It should read, “That the House of Commons set up a secure electronic voting system”, and the suggestion ends with “and communities”, which was an amendment proposed by Madam Petitpas Taylor.

Justin is going to go through a recorded vote for this recommendation.

(Text of recommendation as modified agreed to: [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Thank you so much to the clerk.

Next we have the section on question period. There are no recommendations for that.

Moving forward to the section on future work—

Go ahead, Ms. Blaney.

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

I'm going to be a pain. I wanted to propose having a recommendation around the five-minute component.

As all of you know, we've heard repeatedly that the five-minute exchange seems to be a lot more effective, especially in a virtual placement. I'm willing to not move that we have a recommendation there if everybody.... I know we're all exhausted, but I thought it was something to bring up, the five-minute back-and-forth between the questioner and the....

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

That is completely understood.

Go ahead, Mr. Duncan.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I tweeted about exactly that point last week when I had my chance in the chamber. I loved the five-minute format. I found the tone of the debate much improved, and the back-and-forth allowed you to build on your arguments. I thought the same thing when I had the question period section and it was empty, but after the pandemic I, as an individual member, in future work would like to study and review how those question periods went, those accountability sessions, and whether there is a way we could improve on that.

I've heard from a lot of my colleagues within my caucus about that. If there is some way to add a line, even in the “future work” part, about reviewing it and it could be discussed with members, I think it would be worthwhile. From the perspective of bipartisanship or the tone of the chamber, it would be fantastic to consider.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

I think that might be possible. I've heard a lot of good things about it too, and personally I like watching the exchange in five minutes. It's amazing that it's not until we try something that we know whether or not we like it. I bet in PROC in the 42nd Parliament we would have talked about that and would never have come to an agreement. Once we try it, we realize that there are some good points to it.

It's up to us whether we want to incorporate it somewhere. The first page of the “future work” section has already been dealt with. We dealt with that up front. All of that has been resolved on page 48 of the English version in the first draft of recommendations there. Then I believe we move on to LIB 13.

There the recommendation is to have “a follow-up study on lessons learned from virtual Parliament to consider improvements and modernizations that can be implemented.” That could include the five-minute questioning round. It could include a lot of things. I don't know if anybody wants to limit it and make examples, but right now it's just open-ended. It could include anything, really, for us to study, or for a special committee to study.

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga Centre, ON]

Can we perhaps add to that a line saying “including question period” and maybe, because there's been a lot of talk about voting, add “voting”?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

You would add “including but not limited to question period and voting”.

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga Centre, ON]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ruby Sahota]

Andre will add that language in. This is amended LIB 13.

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

Madam Chair, I can't resist. Can we refer to it as “non-answer” period?

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

How about “rhetorical question” period?