Human Resources Committee on Dec. 2nd, 2010

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Yes, and I'd like to put it to Mr. Lessard. I presume we're going to be dealing with some recommendations coming from the analysts with respect to the long-form census. I'm wondering if this motion shouldn't be delayed by Mr. Lessard until that date, and we should deal with it along with everything else we're doing, rather than as a separate motion. If he's open to that suggestion, I would ask him to not just delay it until Tuesday but until the day we're going to be doing the long-form census.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

Just for your information, right now we are anticipating we would be looking at those recommendations on the ninth, so that would be Thursday.

Mr. Lessard, if that would be acceptable to you, we would deal with your motion on Thursday, or if you prefer, we can do it Tuesday.

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

I believe that Mr. Komarnicki has made a very good suggestion, since we're indeed going to assess the file as a whole before making a recommendation, provided we allow ourselves the time to examine it properly.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

I think right now we have the full meeting, so a full two hours.

Mr. Savage.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you, and I thank Mr. Lessard for the motion. I thank Ed for his comments. I think it makes perfect sense to look at all this as part of the discussion of the report.

I understand there's a concern that Mr. Lessard's motion may be ruled out of order. Is that the case?

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

As it was written there were some concerns with it, yes, from the advice of the clerk and some other advice I received. It was just a couple of things, so it would probably be out of order as it was written.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

But it could be adjusted without a problem?

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

The rules are very clear that we have to stay within our jurisdiction and the mandate of this committee, so we have to be careful that we're not giving instructions. For example, Stats Canada is under the industry portfolio and it's not within our mandate. That was one of the concerns. As well, right now the Statistics Act dictates that we have to have a census every five years. So those are a couple of concerns.

What I would suggest, and obviously you will do exactly as you feel on the right way to proceed, but I know Georges would be happy to take a look. He was the one who initially brought to my attention some of the components that were not in order. So I think we would be able to go ahead and still have it in order.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

With Christmas coming and the Christmas spirit that always envelops this committee, there's going to be a lot of cooperation between now and the holidays, but there isn't a lot of time. So I don't want to spend a lot of time debating a motion that's not in order. I think we should try to make sure we have stuff before us that we can--

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

Right. Mr. Lessard and I had a private conversation on Tuesday about this too, and I think we all agree we want to be looking at a motion that's in order.

Mr. Lessard.

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

I believe we're doing what we had agreed not to do now but rather on Tuesday, that is to say begin debate on the subject.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

Right.

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

There's no problem because we have a difference of opinion, with all due respect to the clerk's opinion. I also believe that Mr. Etoka will acknowledge it, this is not a formal opinion; it's a question that was raised. So I think it deserves to be examined. We believe our motion is admissible. We will obviously have to debate it first.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

Okay. We won't debate it now.

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

We have not only the arguments, but also the documents to show that it is admissible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

Okay. Yes, you're correct, Monsieur Lessard, the motion isn't moved. We have no motion on the table. We won't discuss it further.

Mr. Martin.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

I wanted to raise this morning the reality that we have a direction from the House to revisit Bill C-304, Libby Davies' housing bill. I don't think it will take long. There's an amendment that needs to be made to keep it in order, and I don't think it would take long. I'm therefore suggesting that we schedule that before we rise for the Christmas break.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

All right.

To give information to the committee, we do have sixty sitting days to deal with that bill. I want you to be aware of that, because I know time is short and we do have a work plan established.

Madam Folco.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

We did discuss this, but I don't know how far it has gone. We discussed the possibility of inviting people from CIC again, and I wonder what has happened to that idea.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

Yes, absolutely we will be inviting them again, as well as the foreign affairs officer. Certainly we do want to bring them back, because I think there have been some other issues raised, so yes.

Mr. Watson.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

We'll be submitting this to the clerk directly, but I might as well raise it at the table, since we're talking about potential witnesses. We haven't heard from finance officials on tax measures or the expansion of definitions or carry-forwards, or other issues like that around tax measures related to adoption or medical or disability services that may play into this issue. I think it might be worth while to hear from Department of Finance officials on that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

Yes. We actually hadn't considered that, so perhaps you could make that as a submission.

Mr. Komarnicki and then Mr. Martin.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

I certainly would ask Mr. Martin to consider having that amendment go forward as soon as we get back in the new year. But having said that, I wonder if the clerk could get for this committee, for whenever it comes back, the motion that was passed in the House, the Speaker's ruling on the first bill, including his reasoning behind it, so we would have some opportunity to look at it and consider that as well.

I raise that as a preliminary point.

[The Chair, Conservative, Candice Bergen]

Yes, in preparation for that.

Mr. Martin, did you want to add something?

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Yes, in that spirit of cooperation Mr. Savage spoke of earlier.

I didn't want to have to do it this way. It may not be the appropriate way, but I would move a motion to the committee that we deal with this direction from the House on Ms. Davies' bill before we rise for Christmas.