Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Feb. 1st, 2022

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Indeed, that is in line—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Mr. Fergus, you have 30 seconds left.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Okay, I will make a brief comment.

That is in line with your answer to the question Mr. Vis asked about the importance of retaining some flexibility to make adjustments. That is why planning and construction cannot be done in succession because we know that changes will have to be made to the project over time.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you very much.

We will now begin the third round of questions starting with Mr. Duncan for five minutes. We will then go to Mrs. Romanado for five minutes, Mrs. DeBellefeuille for two and a half minutes, Ms. Blaney for two and a half minutes and, finally, Mr. Gerretsen for five minutes.

Mr. Duncan, the floor is yours.

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

Madam Chair, before my time starts, I have just a note for the agenda. In looking at it, I see that we have a round left here, but if we have time to go in camera briefly at the end.... I have a couple of questions left, maybe not even the full amount, and if there is time, we're willing to go in camera to finalize our agenda.

I would say, too, as opposed to doing it on Thursday, that we could maximize our time. I know there have been some good questions today, but we want to maximize the time with Mr. Dion on Thursday.

If there's a willingness on your part, I'll just leave that in your hands to perhaps discuss after this round.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

I'll just chime back really quickly. I'm watching the time closely and trying to keep it moving, but the last round, which is a mirror of this round minus your second slot, has taken over 30 minutes. We'll keep it moving. If it's possible, for sure we'll maximize our time.

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

Okay.

My questions perhaps are some follow-ups. I believe there was some discussion last year in June, as I was mentioning in my opening round, about governance and some of the concerns. You have the full slide of the many parliamentary partners that you have to consult and get views from. There were some discrepancies with the Senate last year in terms of their requests for several committee rooms. I think it might have been raised in different forms before then.

When it goes to governance, there was a request for an additional $100 million, I believe, for project work to take place. The minister declined that. My first question is, what's the status of that? Has the Senate dropped that and acknowledged that, or is there a negotiation going on with parts of their side of the building, for lack of a better term?

[Rob Wright]

On the issues you've emphasized around finalizing some scope elements for the Centre Block and the Parliament Welcome Centre concerning the Senate on the number of offices, the number of committee rooms and a potential dedicated entry into the Parliament Welcome Centre, those discussions are ongoing. We've had very productive conversations with the Senate. I hope that those will conclude very shortly. They haven't been rendered by the Senate at this point, but we're having productive conversations.

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

I'd say that you're on time and on budget, unless the negotiations with the Senate go somewhere as well.

We've talked about the completion. This goes back to the governance. As you mentioned, in the Auditor General's report, there were some concerns. The working group that's going on is addressing some of those.

At what point is the answer from the minister or.... Again, who is leading this effort? Where does it end? Is it when a “no” becomes a negotiation or a back-and-forth in terms of that timeline of moving things along and trying to get into the building in 10 years? Is there a timeline for a negotiation? Do you have any directive from the minister? Have you gone to the minister to say, “Look, this needs to be finalized by X date so we can keep on time”?

[Rob Wright]

This is the nub of the issue, if you will. We have great relationships and great partnerships with the Houses of Parliament. With the governance—and this was something that was pointed out previously—there's not an integrated governance body at the political level. There's no informal mechanism for the Senate, the House and the minister to come together, have conversations and create alignment.

We get requirements from the Senate and the House, not from Parliament. It is a challenge to reconcile those. We are accountable to Parliament. It is a challenge for the executive branch to do that reconciliation on behalf of Parliament to ensure that we have alignment between the Senate and the House and can move forward.

We've had great success in bringing those things to resolution in the past. I'm convinced we will again, but it is a challenge within the governance frame.

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

The idea today is getting the briefing, the information and updates, but that is something that.... This is the challenge.

I asked the question a couple of years ago, as well, of where you have PROC, you have the Board of Internal Economy, you have a subcommittee, you have the Senate, and you have all of those partners. Yes, the buck stops with the minister at the end of the day, but that is a major portfolio. This alone is a major project.

It continues to where we have negotiations going on one side, while you're trying to keep to a timeframe and a budget, and there are other parameters going on there. That's continued every time you've had this conversation, going back to the Auditor General's report 12 years ago. There continue to be questions about....

I'll say to you for your.... You come to our committee or different work to say, “We're on time and we're on budget,” but there are governance factors stretching both of those things out and complicating that. That needs to be known to the players or whoever has the firm decision.

I appreciate the background or an update on that.

I'm good with my time, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Excellent. Thank you for the 30 seconds back.

Ms. Romanado, five minutes go to you.

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

Thank you very much for the presentation. I am new to PROC, so I have not had the chance to see all of this project. I have lots of questions.

What will become of the current visitor centre that is located between Centre Block and West Block? A lot of money was put into that, and unfortunately we probably didn't get as much leverage out of it, given COVID.

[Michel Patrice]

It's being explored right now. Once the parliamentary welcome centre comes online, the need for that entrance for visitors will be limited and would be costly to operate. One of the scenarios is essentially to repurpose the space, but also to use it as a business continuity entrance.

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

You spoke a little about some of the efforts that will be improving the level of GHG in the building. We talked about geothermal. We talked about insulation and water retention. Can you elaborate a bit on using grey water? Is there a plan for composting on Parliament Hill for that? That's something we haven't seen in here.

Given the fact that it looks like we're going to eliminate some courtyards—we did with West Block, and it looks like it might be the same with East Block—there's not a lot of green space for employees who work on the Hill to be able to go outside and have lunch at a picnic table. The House of Commons employs a ton of people, so what are the plans to make this workspace a little greener for the people who work here?

[Rob Wright]

I'll pass it over to Ms. Garrett in a second.

There are just a couple of things there, and I'll branch back on the Visitor Welcome Centre to just add a piece to what Mr. Patrice said. The main part of the Visitor Welcome Centre will interconnect with the Parliament Welcome Centre as well, and that is part of making that one integrated facility, so a lot of those investments will be reused, if you will, as well, in addition to what Mr. Patrice indicated.

On the courtyards, it's important to note that those were inaccessible, unused courtyards before, so you couldn't get into them. I would see this as more of a bonus for the building rather than taking anything away.

As far as the greening of the Hill goes, that's a major part of the long-term vision and plan. In the public opinion research that Mr. Patrice mentioned, that was one issue that came back from the public as well.

I'll pass it over to Ms. Garrett to speak more about the sustainability efforts.

[Jennifer Garrett]

Maybe just very quickly, about outside—and not necessarily related to sustainability—on the seating question, we will be doing some work to better plan the landscape and opportunities. Seating and obviously shade are often things we get feedback on, and we're going to have to try to address those as we go forward on the project.

With regard to grey water, absolutely, grey water systems are yet another of those tools that we're going to be implementing to achieve that carbon neutrality.

I will make maybe just a minor comment on the courtyards, to supplement what Mr. Wright said. With those opportunities to use the courtyards that were unused, they will hopefully become much better spaces and places for parliamentarians, and we can absolutely look at how we might green those and make sure we put those elements into them. We can absolutely look at that as part of the planning and design.

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

It may sound like a bizarre suggestion, but I have been talking about this since I got elected in 2015. Parliamentarians move around the parliamentary precinct, and often we're bouncing from one meeting to another. We don't actually have any space to store our belongings. I have been suggesting for years that we have a locker system—and I know it sounds as though we're back in high school—maybe in a basement along a hallway where we could store our boots and coats and whatever so they're not in the lobby and not using prime real estate. We might also need to put our book or binder from a committee or something like that into a secure location. Is this a possibility? I was hoping it would be in this building. It's not. I'm hoping that in 10 years' time, we could have a little space where we could keep our belongings.

[Michel Patrice]

Madam Chair, we've heard that comment, probably from this member and from other members. There will be such spaces within the precinct at different spots.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

Mr. Patrice, I could not have asked for a shorter answer, so thank you.

Mrs. DeBellefeuille, you now have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Salaberry—Suroît, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

As you mentioned, this is my first meeting of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. I would like to use my time to congratulate you. As chair, you have been very careful about distributing speaking time fairly among all committee members.

As whip of the Bloc Québécois, I want to say that you are a role model who should inspire some of your colleagues who chair committees. I wanted to tell you that you are doing amazing work. I feel that you are really sincere in your desire for fairness. You have given each member of the committee an opportunity to speak today. You did so while complying with our internal economy decisions.

I have no further questions for the witnesses, and I am happy with the answers they have given us. Today's meeting has helped us obtain a number of answers to our questions.

Once again, Madam Chair, please continue your good work and continue to inspire your colleagues who are chairing other committees.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you very much, Mrs. DeBellefeuille.

With a team like ours, it is easy to work together. So I am the one who should thank the committee members for their work and their comments.

Mrs. DeBellefeuille, thank you for taking the time to say such nice things to me. I will continue to do whatever I can to ensure the committee's productivity. I think that is what Canadians want, and that is what we will try to give them.

We will continue with Ms. Blaney for two and a half minutes.

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

I would like to ask a few questions and then let you answer them, just to conserve as much time as I can.

First, I really appreciate what Mr. Vis said earlier. It would be very helpful to the committee, I think, to have a regional breakdown of contracts so that we understand where across the country they're coming from. The west is always wanting to make sure it gets a component of that, and as a B.C. MP, I agree with that, so that would be very helpful to the committee.

I also have a question around addressing the reality of the environment we live in and having a carbon-neutral facility. I'm really interested in the costs that we will save at the other end of this. I understand that it will cost money to create this, but there was a bit of discussion in your presentation about lowering some of those energy costs. It would be great to get an idea of what that would look like. It's always good to hear that we're spending money to save money in the long run.

The last quick question I have is around the welcome centre and security. I understand that you can't go into details, for very obvious reasons, but of course the welcoming area that we had previously was very cramped and sometimes very frustrating, especially for the amazing staff who were having to address security issues while making sure everybody moved through there. Sometimes it was for MPs who were trying to get people in for a meeting that they needed to get to. I remember sometimes being asked to run down and get people through that lineup as quickly as possible. People didn't always know who I was, and it became this big issue. I'm curious to know how you're addressing that and if there will be clarity about who should go where and in what stream when they arrive.

There you go. Thank you.

[Rob Wright]

I will start, but Mr. Patrice might want to add some elements in there.

We can come back with that regional breakdown.

On the sustainability costs, you're quite right that there are savings. It comes fairly close to cost-neutral when you do all of the math. There's still a cost, but certainly with the investments up front you get a lot of savings over time.

On the issue of the Parliament Welcome Centre, I mean, that really is about balance. It's a significant security enhancement for the precinct. It provides secure screening outside of the footprint of the buildings for the first time on the Hill, and that's fundamental. It very much is a significant security feature that is balanced with creating an open and welcoming environment for visitors to come in, more than doubling the capacity for Canadians to be able to engage into the buildings. That's something we heard from public opinion research as well.

Go ahead, Michel.

[Michel Patrice]

As Rob mentioned, the old visitors entrance was less than optimal in relation to security. In addition, it was less than optimal for tours, parliamentary business and parliamentarians or accredited personnel. The new design, as proposed right now, will offer obviously increased security in terms of distance from the main building, but also a dedicated lane for parliamentary business or accredited personnel through the buildings and an increase for the tours.