Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Feb. 13th, 2008

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

We do have a quorum in the room, so I would ask people to please come to the table.

I want to welcome the departmental officials back to the table once again. I don't believe I'll bother to introduce them again, as they were here on Monday. So welcome, and thank you for coming back again.

We are going to be considering Bill C-37, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act. The departmental officials are here, of course, to help us in that regard.

I want to welcome legislative clerk Mr. Marc Toupin here today as well. Welcome to the table.

Did I hear a point of order?

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

It's just a general point.

Have we invited all the witnesses? Some witnesses were exempt from the invitation. Could you clarify how we picked the witnesses who will testify in front of us, and why some witnesses were omitted?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Were some of the witnesses omitted?

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

They were not invited.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

We had a group of witnesses submitted to us, and I think we just went down the list and invited them.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Do you want to go through that list, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Do you have the list? No, It's not here.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Was a member of my family on the list I submitted?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Yes, they were.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Why was she omitted?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

We just went down the list. It was my understanding that we went down the list as they came, and I think that on Monday I indicated to the committee that we did have one person left on the list. I think if you check the blues, you'll see that I indicated to the committee we had one person left, who was your daughter.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

She was not invited to begin with.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Well, I don't know if she was or not.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Could you ask the clerk if she was invited?

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. Andrew Chaplin]

I did not contact her.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Is there a particular reason she wasn't invited or contacted, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

I have no idea.

[An hon. member]

I'll speak to that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

No, I have Mr. Telegdi first.

[Andrew Telegdi, Liberal, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

I'm going to let you handle this one. It would have been nice to have the Canadian Council for Refugees. They made a submission and would have come here today.

I'm a little concerned, and I think we'd better have the steering committee look at this in the future and then have the committee approve it, because this has not been an overly satisfactory process. But then we did make the motion that we were not going to hear any more witnesses as of the last meeting.

But it really isn't proper, and I want to make sure this does not repeat itself in the future.

Then I would like to speak—

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Is it the Canadian Council for Refugees you're talking about?

[Andrew Telegdi, Liberal, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

That's right. They were given virtually no notice and were unable to come on Monday. They could have come today. It would have been worthwhile hearing from them. But the reality is.... Well, I'll speak to this afterwards.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Okay.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Mr. Chair, on the issue I asked you about before, I don't think Mr. Batters has anything to do with it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Are you on that point as well?