Human Resources Committee on May 6th, 2021

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 32 of the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format pursuant to the House order of January 25, 2021. Proceedings will be available via the House of Commons website, and the webcast will always show the person speaking rather than the entirety of the committee.

The committee will now proceed to consideration of matters related to committee business. I will remind members that we are in public, not in camera.

I see we have a speakers list already.

I recognize Mr. Vaughan.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

Hopefully to move forward collegially, I'm going to move that we defer consideration of Mr. Turnbull's motion, and I will cede the floor to MP Falk to consider her motion to have a study on seniors as currently configured.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Mr. Vaughan.

Ms. Falk please.

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Thank you, Chair, and thank you, MP Vaughan, for working cordially with us.

I would like to move a motion that the committee prioritize the seniors study, as amended, and unanimously agreed to on Tuesday, February 2, 2021, as the next study to be undertaken by this committee.

At our last meeting, I did go at length into why I believe this is an important and timely study for us to do. Seniors built this country, and we definitely have the opportunity right now to look at how COVID has affected them, and where we could do a better job after the fact, and even where we could do better the next time something like this happens.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Ms. Falk.

The motion is in order, and the debate is on the motion.

Ms. Chabot.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I will be in favour of the motion we are debating now. We made ample mention of the work we had done among ourselves, collegially, at the February 2 meeting, suggesting we look at the seniors' study after the employment insurance study.

Ms. Falk's proposal is along those lines. That was her proposal, and I hope we can come to a consensus on that, Mr. Chair.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Ms. Chabot.

Is there any further discussion on the motion?

Ms. Falk.

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Chair, if there is agreement for this to be the next study, I would ask if we could start the study next Thursday, just to give time for witnesses to be contacted and give them enough of a heads-up.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Yes, that's fine in terms of the logistics.

Perhaps we can deal with the motion and then talk about the logistics. I would think next Thursday is reasonable. It will take time to get the witness list and to get them invited, etc., but that sounds fine.

Are there any further interventions on the motion?

Seeing none, is it the will of the committee to adopt the motion by consensus, or do we require a standing vote?

(Motion agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Is there any further committee business?

Sorry, with regard to the timing, Madam Clerk, I think Ms. Falk's proposition is eminently reasonable, and I think we need to discuss a deadline for the submission of witness lists and the like.

We have some hands up, so let's deal with the other committee business and then we'll come back to the specifics of the logistics of the next study.

I recognize Ms. Blaney, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's interesting to see you in a different committee today. We spend a lot of time in the veterans affairs committee together.

Thank you, everyone. I'm very pleased to see that a study on seniors is happening. That's such an important issue and we know the challenges that seniors have faced. As I am here on behalf of Madam Gazan, I want to move the notice of motion that she put forward on May 4.

If the chair is willing for this to happen right now, I'm happy to move:

That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study on guaranteed livable basic income as a significant and meaningful measure to address the post-pandemic economic recovery, eradicate poverty, strengthen Canada’s social safety net, and ensure the respect, dignity and security of all persons in respect of Canada’s domestic and international legal obligations; that this study shall take no less than three meetings, and that the committee report its findings and recommendations to the House.

I would hope to see that study after the seniors study.

I will leave it to you, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Ms. Blaney. The motion is in order.

Ms. Chabot, you have the floor.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I didn't want to speak to this motion right away. I had a comment on the order of business. I know it is up to you and the clerk to get our order right.

I just want us to remember that we have more time behind us than ahead of us between now and the end of June. Next Thursday, I think we would have time to call for submissions and look at the witness list.

I am concerned about completing the study on urban, rural and northern indigenous housing by the end of the session; we have been conducting it for several weeks and have invited many witnesses for it. I imagine that will be on our agenda. I would also like to complete the review of the employment insurance system, which is the work that we just did.

I understand that all of this can tie in with the motion we just passed on seniors.

Those are my concerns, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Ms. Chabot.

Mr. Vaughan.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

I will move what I hope is a friendly amendment to support the basic income study coming next after this.

In the space between starting and stopping studies, we also have to accommodate Mr. Vis's request for a final report on RHI, as well as bring CMHC's order in council appointment for the new head of CMHC. We can fit those in as we move to drafting instructions and preparing witnesses, for example, to complete the EI study. We have three other elements of business that we have to fit in between the scheduling of those two studies, and as we have over time, we'll commit to fitting those in, because those are also outstanding motions.

The amendment would be to order the basic income study next after the seniors study and in between, where schedule permits, to fulfill our requirements to bring the head of CMHC in for the order in council appointment and to bring the rapid housing initiative report forward and have officials here to answer questions. Then I agree, we also have to complete the EI study as well as the URN study.

I would propose that motion, and then explain that once we do that, we can actually move a separate motion to go in camera to finish the URN study, which really has only one recommendation to wordsmith, and we can do that this afternoon and hopefully get the URN study finished and then set ourselves up Thursday to finish the EI report. I will also endeavour to see if we can get the Minister of Seniors and officials here to kick-start the seniors report even sooner to free up time later in the schedule for those other challenges we have.

The motion would be an amendment to Ms. Gazan's motion to adopt her study as the second, to commit to making the CMHC request and the RHI report part of the schedule as the committee and officials become available, and then we will deal with the motion later to finalize the URN report.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

There's a lot there.

Ms. Blaney, do you consider that to be friendly? It's only friendly if you say it is.

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

I consider that to be friendly. It's a bit long, but as long as it has the key wording and we're the next study after the important one of seniors, I am absolutely supportive.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

That's the intent.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

The intent is to fill in the gaps with the matters that have been raised by Mr. Vis, who I now recognize.

Mr. Vis.

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Maybe I will move a friendly subamendment to the subamendment: that the clerk of the committee undertake to have Romy Bowers appear at our Tuesday meeting to discuss her new role at CMHC.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Mr. Vis, I want to let you know that when you presented your notice of motion, which has not yet been moved, we immediately reached out to CMHC, in the anticipation that your motion would be adopted by the committee, to determine the availability of Ms. Bowers. As of right now, we're told that she isn't available before the break week. We had tentatively set a date for May 13 with her, but she's no longer available at that time.

Your suggestion that she come on Tuesday, then, is one that we know now has already been floated and not accepted. Just so you know, in the anticipation that everyone would be agreeable to what you presented in the notice of motion, we put it out there, and we will continue to attempt to fix a date in the expectation that your motion will pass.

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Okay. In good faith, then, I will remove my suggested subamendment to the subamendment.

I will note, Mr. Chair, that you have a nice picture from British Columbia there, from near Revelstoke, B.C.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Yes, indeed. It was painted by a downtown Charlottetown painter.

Ms. Chabot, you have the floor.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Wow, life is good today.

We all understand that the seniors' study, the topic of the motion we just passed, becomes the next study. The motion we will be debating later will be on minimum income and may be the second study. My main concern is that I don't want these two studies to take precedence over the studies we have already done, the rural, urban and northern indigenous housing study and the review of the employment insurance system. As part of our work, we are adopting a motion on another study, but first we need to have completed the reports on the two studies we have done. In other words, just to be clear, the order of the studies is not: seniors, minimum income, indigenous housing and employment insurance. We must also respect the work we have done and set a goal of doing everything we can by the end of June to have it completed. I am concerned that Ms. Falk's study spans six meetings.

After all that, we could discuss the next study topic of minimum income.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Ms. Chabot, I firmly believe that we are on the same page. I hope that we will complete the study on indigenous housing today and as soon as the draft report on employment insurance is ready, it will be presented to the committee for review. We are exactly on the same page.

Are there any further interventions on the motion?

Ms. Chabot, did you have something to add?

Seeing none, are we ready for the question?

You have heard Ms. Blaney's motion and the friendly amendment by Mr. Vaughan. Are we in agreement to pass this by consensus?

Madam Chabot.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

I'm sorry; the hand goes up, down, and up again; it makes us do virtual exercise.

I want to be completely transparent, Mr. Chair. I will not object to the question of the minimum income study. I think we know that on the NDP side it is talked about regularly. But this is an issue that goes beyond the federal level. It's a substantive issue, and I'm not sure where this minimum income study is going to take us.

I will not oppose it, but quite honestly I am puzzled by the conclusions that could be drawn from such a study that would seek to implement a basic or guaranteed minimum income. We know full well that this involves all the provinces and their social programs.

We can do a theoretical study, but, quite honestly, I doubt the conclusions of such a study.