Evidence of meeting #12 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was pandemic.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ruby Sahota
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.
I have Mr. Doherty for five minutes.
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
I want to echo the sentiments of many of my colleagues. We do appreciate the service that the House administration, as well as our Parliamentary Protective Service, put forth every day. I know that very often that goes without anyone saying thank you, so I would like to say a heartfelt thanks to you all.
Mr. Speaker, when are the estimates prepared that we're looking at today?
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Anthony Rota Liberal Nipissing—Timiskaming, ON
I think I'm going to refer that one right to Mr. Paquette. He'll be able to give you exact dates on that.
12:15 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer, House of Commons
Basically, if we look at it, we're in the midst right now of preparing the estimates for next year.
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Okay, so would these have been done pre-election 2019?
12:15 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer, House of Commons
It was just after the election. They would have gone to the board in late November or early December.
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
12:15 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer, House of Commons
At this point, we've adjusted the request for the supplementary estimates (B), which are usually done once the fiscal year has started. That's where we've adjusted our request for the carry-forward and reduced it by the amount of the committee and associations, the funding that had been provided there for events that have either been cancelled or postponed. So we have not kept keeping the cash attributed to us if we didn't need to use it. That's why we adjusted it, but at this point here, because we have access to the supplementary estimates, that is where we would do the adjustments had there needed to be some for the current fiscal year.
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Have you had to adjust up, given the additional costs of the hybrid sittings and protective services and technology, or have those estimates stayed the same?
12:15 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer, House of Commons
The estimates have stayed the same at this point because we're looking at a trade-off between some of the savings that we've had and have just talked about—some of the travel savings and savings in materials and supplies from some of the services that were closed during the lockdown. Those savings at this point have been sufficient to cover the incremental costs or disbursements relating to COVID.
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
One of the highlights of the new study of this year's main estimates for the House is a program for human resources advisory services for members in our capacity as employers. What does this program involve?
12:15 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer, House of Commons
I think I'd like to pass this on to Michelle Laframboise, our CHRO.
12:15 p.m.
Michelle Laframboise Chief Human Resources Officer, House of Commons
Thank you, Mr. Paquette.
The member advisory services is a team that has been put in place within the human resources services to provide advisory services to members in their roles as employers. This team does several things. One of the things they do is provide individual counselling and advice on employment situations on a variety of different human resources functions. They also put together the onboarding program and the continuous training program for members and their staff. Obviously, that program is much busier after an election, but there is a fairly constant and ongoing need for continuous training and development.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
If I'm understanding this correctly, there's non-partisan House staff getting involved in recruiting, screening and hiring political staff for MPs for their own offices.
12:20 p.m.
Chief Human Resources Officer, House of Commons
No, they provide advice, guidance, templates, tools and draft policies for members to consider if they are looking for advice. Really, it's a consulting service. We're not responsible for the function itself. We provide purely advisory and consulting services.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
12:20 p.m.
Chief Human Resources Officer, House of Commons
That's a very good question. I'd have to go back and confirm, but my understanding is that they are.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Thank you.
In past years when the estimates were under consideration, there were questions about a plan to place a procedural clerk directly in the Liberal House leader's office.
Mr. Robert, can you confirm that none of our non-partisan clerks were placed there?
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Then that proposal is dead and it hasn't been revisited?
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ruby Sahota
I'm sorry, Mr. Doherty, but that's all the time we have before we start with a new questioner.