Evidence of meeting #20 for Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was workers.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Yes, we can circulate that to the committee right away.
Conservative
Raquel Dancho Conservative Kildonan—St. Paul, MB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
There are a couple of things. I think we now understand where that mysterious third hour was on Thursday. It's disappointing that we just approved the subcommittee report. It's been a number of weeks since we met as a subcommittee and had plenty of time to discuss this very lengthy motion with committee members that perhaps all members could support.
I note we had a good discussion on one of Madam Chabot's motions about giving ample notice for translation and this all went out the window when there would have been ample time to provide that lengthy motion. I would ask that the motion be immediately emailed to everyone.
What I also found interesting is that not only did you not circulate the motion, Mr. Kusmierczyk, but my office connected with the minister's office today and this did not come at all. This is definitely springing it on the committee without any collaboration whatsoever, and that's very disappointing.
Last, Mr. Kusmierczyk, I will mention that after the bill briefing with the minister, I emailed you immediately with a specific question about this bill and you never got back to me. You said you would and you never did. I find it interesting that there's this urgency from your government, Mr. Kusmierczyk and members of this committee, and yet you didn't even get back to me on a very simple question that I emailed you about.
So which one is it? Is it politics or is it that you do genuinely care about the well-being of Canadians? It seems very unclear to me with the antics that are going on in this committee right now. It's very disappointing, considering Conservatives have said very clearly we support getting supports to Canadians, and yet the Liberal narrative to date has been that we've delayed and yet this bill should have been presented a very long time ago.
As we learned today, your government learned that there would be concerns with the limited 26 weeks of EI in early January, and yet it wasn't until the end of February that you presented this bill to opposition parties. Then our first opportunity to debate it was Monday and here we are it's Tuesday and your government is saying we're delaying it.
I also feel it's jumping the gun a little, but we don't know what our House leaders are going to negotiate and this bill could skip all stages this week. Who knows.
I'm quite disappointed with this non-collaborative nature of Liberal members on this committee today.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Liberal
Adam Vaughan Liberal Spadina—Fort York, ON
I'm sure from the opposition's side the timetable looks compressed. I will share that as a parliamentary secretary who has had to pull legislation through a department, through Finance and Treasury Board while respecting parliamentary privileges, that you can't talk about a bill until it's presented on the floor of Parliament. We are up against two timetables as opposed to the opposition, which is on the receiving end of whatever comes out of that process.
I hope the opposition doesn't see this as an antic. I think that was the word used to describe it. We have a significant challenge in front of us in supporting Canadians, and we have a significant responsibility to make sure those benefits aren't interrupted so people's lives are not put in harm's way. It is not easy to always land legislation on a particular day, a particular time and a particular schedule that the committee has set to deal with these issues.
COVID has not made it easier with Zoom calls and meetings. We are all familiar with the bandwidth challenges in staging committees and moving committees around. If we were all in Ottawa, there would have been a much different way of dealing with many of these things, but we would still have run up against not being able to talk about legislation before it's tabled in the House; otherwise, there would be a contempt charge filed against us so fast. You know how those things work, and we have to respect those parameters as best we can.
I assure you we are moving in good faith to move together, but the goal here is to help Canadians and get this legislation started. If the House leaders can come to an agreement on how to fast-track this bill, all the more power to them. But as the government we have to prepare for all eventualities. In good faith, that's exactly what we're doing and that's why the motion has been presented as we presented it.
We have a profound responsibility to address the challenges that are addressed in this bill, but also to deliver it to Canadians. I hope we can recognize that in this circumstance time is not our friend, but the opposition members still are our friends. Hopefully we're working together to get a positive result.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you, Mr. Vaughan.
Mr. Blaikie, welcome to the committee. You have the floor.
NDP
Daniel Blaikie NDP Elmwood—Transcona, MB
Thank you very much for that welcome. I'm glad to be here.
I want to start by saying that we certainly support the principle of trying to get to an early study of this bill, given the time constraints we find ourselves under. There is a little bit of frustration there, because I think these dates are not surprise dates or dates that came up suddenly. These are deadlines that have long been established. I think it's always preferable to get to work sooner on these things. Many of the income support proposals, certainly the legislative side of them, had this kind of eleventh hour aspect to them when they came to Parliament in the fall...and the prorogation that we all know about. I'm looking at Mr. Long. He sat in on some of the procedure and House affairs committee meetings where we discussed that in great detail.
I do think at a certain point it's incumbent on government to get a handle on these deadlines so that we're not always curtailing parliamentary process, but we will have to continue to do that in some way, shape or form in order to provide support to Canadians. It's not a choice that I think we should have to make. I do beseech the government to get its act together and bring things forward in a more timely way.
That said, I want to speak to some of the details of the proposal, because I think getting down to an early study is helpful. That could help expedite the process. I want to note that the bill was introduced, and we're now being asked to set a pretty rigid schedule for how it will proceed at committee before parties have even had an opportunity to meet in their normal Wednesday caucus meeting. I believe the bill was tabled at the last sitting Thursday, and we haven't had a sitting Wednesday yet. The deadline in the motion for proposed amendments is tomorrow at five o'clock. That seems to me to be pretty short.
I notice also that there are members in the House whose parties don't have a seat at this table who will find out, if the committee decides to pass this motion, either very late today or early tomorrow that they have less than a day to contact the legislative counsel and try to prepare any amendments. It seems to me that the amendment deadline given, when we don't know when the bill is going to come to the committee, is a little tight. I would like to try to make some room for a little more time to be able to consider potential amendments. That would be either by striking paragraph (e), which has the deadline, or by having a caveat that would say that people have to submit amendments essentially within a sitting day of the bill passing through the House.
I think there's some flexibility there. I don't want it to get in the way of making progress today in terms of getting the study under way. I think there should be some allowance made for the fact that there are members who may yet know nothing about this plan for the bill and who nevertheless will have an interest in the bill and will need time to prepare any suggestions that they want to make constructively to the committee.
Bloc
Louise Chabot Bloc Thérèse-De Blainville, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
First of all, I agree with all of you, although we have been made aware only verbally of the gist of the motion: that it is a pre-study of Bill C-24. However, for your information, since I was mentioned by name, let me remind you that I had presented the committee with a routine motion that had the same objective, namely that motions should be introduced in writing and translated in both official languages. That motion was defeated. So you must not complain now that you didn't receive a motion in writing in both languages. My proposal was not accepted because you said that it would delay our work.
However, it is quite unusual to work in an ad hoc manner by doing a preliminary study of a bill that we have not yet received. Despite that, in this case, we know that the situation is urgent. I understand that we lost some time because the conditions were not ideal, but we really should have acted with more care and more foresight.
We were in a similar situation after the Speech from the Throne that was delivered when we came back from the prorogation. We should have adopted and extended the temporary measures in all urgency because some of them were going to come to an end. That happened in the House, not at the committee.
However, we could look further ahead this time. It is true that the bill was introduced yesterday, on Monday, March 8, but each party still had the time to make themselves aware of it. Some technical information sessions followed. We were therefore not completely in the dark on Monday morning.
I agree that we must look further ahead, but, at the same time, we have to consider the current situation. If nothing is done and we do not speed things up, thousands of workers will be penalized. Is that what we want? My answer is no, which is why I will be supporting this motion.
Conservative
Raquel Dancho Conservative Kildonan—St. Paul, MB
I'm just a bit confused. In paragraph b) the motion is proposing that the minister come from 3:30 to 4:30 on Thursday, which she already is, to discuss supplementary estimates and main estimates, and then witnesses for this would be from 4:30 to 5:30, which was supposed to be Mr. Hussen's time.
Am I understanding this correctly that the minister would be coming just if this motion passes and that what we just voted on is garbage? Am I understanding that correctly?
Then I have a follow-up comment.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Yes, I would take this as superseding the motion we just passed. I don't know about the term “garbage”, but I think Minister Hussen would be then uninvited and this motion would take precedence.
Conservative
Raquel Dancho Conservative Kildonan—St. Paul, MB
By garbage, I meant because it is literally going to go into the garbage, since it is not valid anymore. I'm just unclear on why Liberal members voted for this, but then put this motion forward, knowing that it would supersede what they just voted for, so again, not in good faith, very disappointing....
Again, I agree completely with Mr. Blaikie. Tomorrow is the first opportunity that opposition members get to discuss this with their caucus. For amendments, it is pretty critical that we have consultation with our caucus. It's pretty standard. Again, this just plays back to the fact that this bill was introduced so late, really putting opposition parties in a very tough spot to do their duty. I am just really unsure of why this collaboration is so important....
I would like to hear from Mr. Kusmierczyk, given that he presented this motion. Why is it that he did not respond to my question on why is it so important to him that we throw out what we just agreed to—what he just agreed to—and replace it with this new motion? Why didn't he respond to my question on this bill?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
We're going to Mr. Blaikie and then to Mr. Kusmierczyk.
Go ahead, Mr. Blaikie.
NDP
Daniel Blaikie NDP Elmwood—Transcona, MB
Thank you very much.
Just because I am hoping that we might be able to proceed to a vote after Mr. Kusmierczyk's undoubtedly compelling response to Ms. Dancho's question, I would be remiss if I didn't create the circumstances under which we could vote on my proposal, which is to strike item e) from the motion. I'd like to move formally that this be done.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you, Mr. Blaikie.
The debate now is on the amendment to delete item e).
Mr. Kusmierczyk.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
I'm sorry, is the discussion now just on deleting and changing part e)?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
It is, but if you want to respond to Ms. Dancho, go right ahead.
The first thing we need to do is deal with Mr. Blaikie's amendment and then move on to the main motion.
Go ahead. You have the floor.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
I absolutely do recognize some of the concerns that have been raised by the members, and I know that this is an unusual motion, an unusual request, but again, the situation is such that we are facing an urgent situation, and I'd like all of us, if possible, at this time, to really just focus on what is the important matter at hand here, which is proceeding at the committee here with this study.
In no way does it bias deliberations at caucus. In no way does it bias the outcome of deliberations in the House. This is separate. But again, in anticipation that there will be positive movement in the House, this allows us to begin our work and potentially to conclude the work here at committee so that it does not cause any delay in the eventual passing of this important legislation.
I just wanted to highlight that we are in this situation. There are Canadians who are counting on us to really focus in on this and do what we can to get this legislation passed, which is absolutely critical. This in no way biases what's taking place in the House, what's taking place at caucus. Those conversations will take place, but this allows us to anticipate and begin the work here at committee so that we can make sure that we have a timely passage of this bill, hopefully.
Conservative
Raquel Dancho Conservative Kildonan—St. Paul, MB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I appreciate Mr. Kusmierczyk's words. I still don't feel I got an answer, but I hope he can reach out to me in good faith with a response to my question.
Given how lengthy this motion is—and I know that these discussions are ongoing behind the scenes, as I'm sure all members know—I would ask that we suspend for five minutes just to digest this very lengthy motion. I think that would be fair.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
We only have 10 minutes before we need to adjourn because of the folks who support us.
Do we have consensus to suspend and then come back?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Do we have consensus to suspend or do people want to just plow on for the last 10 minutes?
I see thumbs up all around. We'll suspend until 7:25 p.m., and then we'll be back.
Thank you.