Human Resources Committee on May 10th, 2007

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

I have a hypothetical question.

If potentially there was a change in the political landscape in Quebec and, for whatever reason, a government decided that $7-a-day child care wasn't affordable for the government or wasn't a priority for the government and they decided to do something else, would they still get the money under this bill, even if they decided not to use it on child care?

[Shawn Tupper]

The answer on that is the same as the previous answer, which is that the money flows through the CST, so it doesn't have conditions placed upon it. Indeed, it would flow out and the provinces are able to spend it as they choose to.

We have, to date, had commitments from all the provinces, and every indicator is that they are committed to spending those funds in their child care systems. And we are seeing growth.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

Under this legislation that would change for everyone except Quebec. Quebec would not have to spend the money on child care. Everyone else would under this legislation. Is that right?

[Shawn Tupper]

That would certainly be subject to a legal interpretation of clause 4 in terms of how the opt-out provision for Quebec would work.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

Okay. And I know that in Quebec it's very important to respect the provincial jurisdiction. I mean, the province created a program that sounds, according to my Bloc colleagues, to be very well received. I'm not going to begin to suggest to the Quebec government what they should do in their area of jurisdiction.

I come from Alberta and I know, for example, that in Alberta one of their priorities is autism treatment. It's not a priority anywhere else. I have a son with autism, and it's important to me—$60,000 a year for a proper autism treatment program. In other parts of the country, parents are mortgaging their homes to cover that. Obviously provinces need to choose what their priorities are.

I want to again reiterate who is responsible ultimately. The Alberta government, I take it, would be responsible in areas such as child care to make the right decisions for their citizens. They would be held accountable for those decisions. Am I missing something there?

[Shawn Tupper]

No.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

Okay. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Mr. Lake.

Ms. Yelich, you have the last questions before we take a quick break to get ready to go to clause-by-clause.

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Blackstrap, SK]

I again want to emphasize the provincial jurisdiction and provinces being held accountable. They also want to add an advisory council. Is this something that will help perhaps to make the provinces accountable? I'm not sure. I'm just wondering, in your reading of this bill, what kind of part they play and if the appointment of an advisory council is any measurement of accountability for the provinces. The provinces, you say, don't have to answer to any level of government, whether federal or to each other's government. Therefore this bill couldn't possibly work in making the governments accountable to each other, unless there was perhaps an advisory council.

I'm not sure. I just want to ask about the advisory council and what you saw in that.

[Shawn Tupper]

It's hard, really, to interpret the role the advisory council could play without looking at terms of reference and all of the things that would have to be developed to make an advisory council work. And indeed, that would, I guess, be the choice of those who are responsible for the set-up of that committee.

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Blackstrap, SK]

So then we'd have provinces, the advisory council, and the federal government trying to address this bill. Would the bill even be supported? It seems to be contradictory and very confusing.

Most of the provinces themselves have spoken out against it. I don't know how we can have a national child care bill without all the provinces being in agreement with it.

Who do you deal with? It's not a question. It's just a thought about the advisory council and what part they will play.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

I want to thank the witnesses for being here. You're not going too far?

[Shawn Tupper]

No.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Are you guys going to stick around for a bit?

We'll need about 30 seconds just to change over, so I'll ask the members not to leave their seats, because we may have a hard time getting you back.

Then we'll get started with clause-by-clause.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

We've added 12 amendments that were just brought before the legislative clerk by the NDP. So while they are in order, we're trying to make them sequential, so that we can go through them when the time comes.

If I could get you to take your package, as well as your orders of the day, we can start going through the clause-by-clause.

You'll see as we start going through clause-by-clause consideration that it says that pursuant to Standing Order 75(1) , consideration of the preamble and clause 1 are postponed, so we will come back to that when we get done all the rest.

So that will take us to clause 2.

(On clause 2—Definitions)

I've been informed by the legislative clerk that these motions are not in order. But I would like the member to talk of the thought process and what you're trying to accomplish there. We can have a bit of discussion, but as I said, the legislative clerk has indicated that under clause 2, motions L-1, L-2, and L-3 are not in order.

Ms. Dhalla, if you want to talk a bit about those motions, we can share why they are not in order. Go ahead, Ms. Dhalla.

[Ruby Dhalla, Liberal, Brampton—Springdale, ON]

Just one second, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Sure, no problem.

Mr. Lessard.

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I don't know if this will make things more efficient, but I have looked at the amendments. On the whole, they deal with the inclusion of aboriginal communities in the bill. There was a guiding principle that applied from the start, announced both by the Liberals and the NDP. In my view, we must determine whether we agree on it. If we do, we could then ensure that all necessary provisions are included.

I don't want to get bogged down in procedure; it's just a suggestion. I don't know whether it will make things easier, but in my view it could speed things up.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Sure. You know my decisions up here. I rely very heavily on the clerks here, and I don't arbitrarily call things out of order that are in order. I will call them out of order if the committee so decides that they would like to see that happen, and then we could go through that process.

So once again, that's why I'm asking Ms. Dhalla to talk about her motions a bit. I've given you my ruling based on what the clerk suggested, and then we can go from there. We'll have some discussion and see how it goes.

Ms. Dhalla.

[Ruby Dhalla, Liberal, Brampton—Springdale, ON]

The amendments that I put forward basically relate to trying to ensure that the bill is inclusive of all of the demographics that we're trying to reach out to. One of the most important demographics in Canada is the aboriginal peoples, including first nations, the Inuit, and the Métis people. We heard from a number of different stakeholders from these respective organizations, who all had serious concerns in regards to the fact that they were not included in the original bill.

When we took a look at the Kelowna accord where there was an investment of almost $5.1 billion, we realized that within the accord, there was also a substantial investment to the tune of $345 million over a period of five years for first nations, in particular for early learning and child care. To ensure that this bill is reflective of the needs of many Canadians across this country, we must ensure that we include the aboriginal people, which would include first nations, the Inuit, and the Métis.

I think the hesitation of the AFN, one of the leading spokespeople organizations, to support the bill was in regards to the fact that they had been excluded. I think it's the responsibility of parliamentarians to represent our country, and we must ensure that they are included in this bill, moving forward.

I know the clerk has ruled it out of order because they have deemed it to be out of scope. But I hope that we would have the support of all committee members to have an inclusive bill and include the aboriginal people.

So I would request that the chair please rule it in order. If he is hesitant to do that, perhaps he can put a recorded vote to the committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

She spoke to that motion. I want to give you what the clerk has drafted up for me.

Once again the amendments seek to extend to aboriginal peoples organizations the criteria and conditions that must be met before a child care transfer payment may be made in support of the early learning and child care program. Since the bill, as agreed to in its second reading, only refers to transfer payments made to a province or territory and does not include any reference to aboriginal peoples organizations, I must rule that these amendments are inadmissible on the basis that they are beyond the scope of the bill.

So once again, we can definitely have a vote on that.

I want to mention that the NDP also included as part of the new amendments, with regards to points two and three, which have been ruled inadmissible.... Certainly that is going to be my ruling, as suggested by the legislative clerk, so we can go from there.

If the opposition would like to challenge the ruling of the chair, then we can go for a vote.

[Ruby Dhalla, Liberal, Brampton—Springdale, ON]

Could we please have a recorded vote by all MPs to ensure that we include the amendments?

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Hold on a second. We'll just get some clarification.

I have Mr. Lake and Mr. Lessard.

Mr. Lake.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

I want to get a little clarification on the order here. We're discussing the amendment, which is fine. Should we be voting on this before we discuss it, or do we vote first and then we go in and discuss the actual amendment itself?

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

That's correct.

What has happened here is that we're talking about amendments I've ruled out of order. If the chair is being challenged, we will have that vote, and then that would determine whether those amendments were going to be left in place.