Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
I should mention that in the absence of Madame Hoeppner, I chaired, and therefore there was no Conservative member, but Mr. Komarnicki represented the Conservative side of this committee for the meeting.
Here is what we discussed. First of all, with regard to Bill C-343, as you may know, the bill has to come back to the House on November 5, so we are pretty well late with Bill C-343. So we are suggesting that Bill C-343 be discussed on November 4, but then there's a break week and then it would be discussed again on the 16th, which already makes us late. So if we as a full committee accept that we will continue and finish Bill C-343 on November 16, that would mean we would have to ask the House to accept an extension. According to the clerk--and many of us have gone through this--that means it would have to be presented to the House and there would be an individual vote on the extension.
When we discussed it at the small committee this morning, several members made it clear that extensions have been accorded many times with very few, if any, problems. So the members of the committee felt that asking for an extension would cause no problem at all.
So the clerk has now written a text, which I'm submitting now to the committee.
Before I go on about this extension, let me go on to the next part of our discussion, which is what will happen on the motions.
If all goes well, just to backtrack, we'll discuss Bill C-343 on November 4 and 16. We would then move on to Michael Savage's motion on the long-form census on November 16, and that would continue on the 18th.
For November 23, there are three motions in front of you. They had question marks because they were subject to discussion. The steering committee decided we would take them in a different order. First of all, we would do the adoption study because it's been on for quite some time. That would be number one. That would be followed by Mr. Lessard's motion on the employment insurance board of referees. He thinks it would take two or possibly three days. That would be followed by Mr. Tony Martin's motion on disability-related barriers. We decided we would do them in that order, but we did not give specific dates to these, although we are suggesting they be taken in that order because there will be a number of private members' bills and possibly even a government bill that might come in. Of course they get priority.
So we're suggesting to the full committee an order for the motions and we're suggesting that the dates for these motions be accepted as they come up, given the number of private members' bills.
I was checking just a few minutes ago, and I can tell you that coming from the Liberal Party there are possibly five or six private members' bills that will be coming up in the near future that will have to be discussed here in this particular committee. There may be more private members' bills that I'm not aware of coming from the other parties. So that is it.
So the first thing I am submitting to this committee as a report, on which I need agreement, is the request for an extension for Bill C-343. The clerk has written a draft, which I will read out. I will read it out in English, and obviously the translation will be available.
Report of the subcommittee. It was agreed (1) that a report be adopted and presented to the House asking for an extension of 30 sitting days to consider Bill C-343; (2) that Bill C-343 be taken up on November 4, and November 16, as I mentioned; (3) that the business of the committee be conducted in the following order: one, motion of Mr. Casson on the adoption study; followed by, two, the motion by Mr. Lessard, employment insurance board of referees; and after that, three, the motion by Mr. Martin, disability-related barriers. These studies will be conducted without any limitation in terms of number of meetings, provided that time will be made for any private member's bill referred to the committee, and the study under consideration at that time will be suspended for the study of the bill.
So that is what I would like to submit to this committee. If you agree to that, the next step will be for the clerk to write out a submission to the House, which will be tabled by the chair of this committee. Then it will go its regular way so that we can have a 30-day delay.
Thank you, Madam Chair.