Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Feb. 13th, 2024

[Eric Janse]

Yes.

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

In an open-source assessment, you said that you have analysts who could help to do that work. They'd look into it. Do you think they would have discovered this risk had they done that on this particular individual?

[Patrick McDonell]

Yes.

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

You do. Okay.

You definitely don't do the check for reputational risk; you're saying that this is a suggestion in the future for people who might be recognized. Is that correct, Mr. Janse? That is something that does not exist.

[Eric Janse]

That's correct.

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

In the exchange with Mr. Calkins in the beginning, when Mr. Calkins was asking about this being in a different room, essentially, because Parliament is not sitting, he said that you didn't have the proper tools to do the vetting. Then you responded and said that yes, that was correct.

I don't understand what you meant there, because it sounds like you didn't already have the tools and that even if you did, we certainly don't use them.

[Eric Janse]

Perhaps I misspoke.

Tools are one thing. As the Sergeant-at-Arms has indicated, we have the tools. I think the issue would be more about the time that it would take if you wanted to do that for all 500 guests, which is why a suggestion is to maybe limit it just to a few, to those who have more than just a spectator role.

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

When an event like this does go on in the room, even though it's not an official sitting, you still have access to the tools that you would normally have access to, with time constraints considered as well, correct?

[Eric Janse]

Yes.

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

That's all I have, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Ms. Romanado is next.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you so much for being here today.

Mr. Janse, you mentioned that normally an attendee has no role during a special joint address of Parliament and that recognition of someone in the gallery does not normally occur.

When I look at chapter 9 of Bosc and Gagnon, I see that they do have, in figure 9.1, a list of all of the special addresses from 1940 until 2017 of special speakers in the House.

Would you know if there was ever somebody recognized in the gallery during one of these addresses? Is this the first time that someone was recognized by the Speaker during a joint address by the Speaker?

[Eric Janse]

That's a very good question, Ms. Romanado.

It's a fairly recent development. I'm trying to think.... The first time it happened was at the Biden address.

Jeffrey, do you want to jump in?

[Jeffrey LeBlanc, Deputy Clerk, Procedure, House of Commons]

I don't remember it being done before the Biden address, but there were definitely people recognized in the gallery during the Biden address. That was in March of last year.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Was this someone recognized by the Speaker officially?

[Jeffrey LeBlanc]

I don't believe it was by the Speaker. I believe it was by the Prime Minister. I'm testing my memory, but I believe it was by the Prime Minister.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Then there's a difference between the Prime Minister in his address recognizing people in the gallery or in the crowd and so on and so forth. What we're referring to is the Speaker independently recognizing someone in the Speaker's gallery, in the reserved section. In this case, he had eight seats allocated to him, based on the information provided on the list of precedence.

Would you say that, going forward, anybody.... I don't know about you, but when I'm asked if I would like to bring a guest, I make sure that whoever I put forward on a list to attend a special address or a joint address at Parliament is somebody who would be worthy of attending such an event. I would assume that it's my due diligence as the inviter to the invitee to verify that this person is, in good faith, able to come into the chamber. Would you say that is correct?

[Eric Janse]

That was always our assumption to date: that the parties did their own vetting and that we would just be responsible for physical security vetting.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

Ms. Gaudreau, you have two and a half minutes.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

What we experienced was a disaster, everyone's well aware of that.

You told me earlier that you didn't know that the Speaker was going to draw attention to Mr. Hunka. What that tells me is that it was his mistake, not yours. You also said that you didn't have enough time to do background checks through open-source verification. Essentially, you bear no responsibility for what happened, since it was on Mr. Rota's initiative. That's what you're saying.

But the Prime Minister also invited Mr. Hunka, a former Nazi, to a ceremony in Ontario. In that particular case, the blame lies with the Prime Minister, wouldn't you say? Actually, I think that's essentially what you said. By inviting Mr. Hunka, the Prime Minister did the same thing as Mr. Rota. It was a deliberate choice.

In this whole affair, wasn't Mr. Rota simply asked to fall on his sword in order to save the Prime Minister? I'd like to know what happened there, because it's so ridiculous. Who can answer me?

[Eric Janse]

The House administration had no involvement whatsoever in the event that was held in Toronto. Unfortunately, I have no idea how those guest lists were compiled. We were only responsible for the event that occurred on Parliament Hill.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

If I understand correctly, the Prime Minister's Office has a verification process in place. When someone raises the alarm and says we should check on this, does the Prime Minister's Office communicate with the Speaker's office? Is there any sharing of information?

[Nancy Anctil]

I couldn't tell you what kinds of communications there are between these two offices.

What I do know is that there's some communication between Parliament's protocol office and the Prime Minister's Office when these events come up. That said, the Prime Minister's Office never shared with us its guest list for the event in Toronto. That was really an entirely separate thing. We weren't at all aware what kind of guests there would be, nor of the possibility that some guests might appear on more than one guest list. Only when the Speakers of both Houses are invited are we involved in any way. Then we notify their respective offices. That said, we're not at all involved in the process related to the other guests.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Okay.

Earlier, I made an official request to obtain all of the relevant information that might help us understand what happened between the day of the event in question and the day of Mr. Rota's resignation. I'm not only talking about the exchanges pertaining to Mr. Hunka, but also about those between the Prime Minister's Office and the office of the Speaker in relation to Mr. Rota's potential resignation. The Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs would like to have that information.

Thank you.