Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Jan. 27th, 2021

[The Clerk]

As I recall, the motion was to adjourn the debate. Following the vote, the chair pronounced that the debate was adjourned until Monday. I don't believe the condition to adjourn until Monday was in the motion itself, if I recall correctly.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Ms. Martinez Ferrada, when you brought the motion to adjourn the debate, did you mention that we adjourn the debate until Monday?

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

I moved to adjourn the debate. If the member wants, she could bring this back on Monday, or at another meeting.

I moved adjournment of the debate.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for the confusion. The debate was adjourned on that.

We will now go to Ms. Dancho.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

I actually believe Mr. Dhaliwal was ahead of me, so I will go after him.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Mr. Dhaliwal, go ahead.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

Madam Chair, we should maintain decorum here. Things were going really well, but the way things are going right now, we're wasting the time of the witnesses. We are just trying to move this to Monday. I think that's a very reasonable ask.

If they really wanted to go at it, they had time before they came to this meeting to have negotiations with other parties. We could have been into the witnesses, who are here to provide valuable input. We should finish this topic, as it's very true that we should go to the witnesses right now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Mr. Dhaliwal.

Ms. Dancho, go ahead.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Since the member wanted to pull some partisan barbs there, I will say that if the Liberal members really did support Hong Kong and perhaps weren't so worried about an election forthcoming, they could easily approve this very simple amendment, which they all agree they support in principle. They did not provide a compelling reason that we should wait until Monday to debate it. The only reason I can assume the Liberal members want to wait until Monday is so that they can figure out a way to not bring the minister into committee to face Ms. Kwan and the questions she raised as well, and a number of other issues that have developed.

I do not understand why we are waiting until Monday. It's a simple amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Madame Martinez Ferrada.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Regarding my colleague's comments, I think it is important to clarify that we have no intention of preventing the minister's appearance before the committee. I think that Ms. Dancho is imputing to us motives we do not have. It is 5:39 p.m., and witnesses have been waiting to testify for 30 minutes. Their testimony is about an issue we all agreed on in December as part of a study that seems extremely important to us.

I would like the clerk to clarify something. Would it be possible to postpone the adopting of the subcommittee's report until next Monday, so that we could have the time to discuss Ms. Dancho's amendment, which was put forward today, and so that we could undertake the study we all agreed upon last December? We could hear from the witnesses who are with us.

In the context of this study that everyone seems to consider important, I don't think partisanship on this matter should exist.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Madame Martinez Ferrada.

We have Madame Normandin.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

I was not aware of the amendment. That is why I simply asked that we postpone it, so that we can debate it and come to an agreement. I am far from wishing for the minister not to appear before the committee. So I don't see how I could be accused of partisanship on this issue.

I was simply not aware of the amendment. I think it is reasonable to debate it a bit later in order to come to a consensus instead of wasting our time and, more importantly, making witnesses who are here waste their time on account of “procedural wrangling”.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you.

We have Ms. Kwan next on the list.

Ms. Kwan, go ahead, please.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I wasn't aware of the motion either. It was the first I heard of it when Ms. Dancho moved it. But in light of the situation that's going on in Hong Kong, I thought that was a good amendment, and I certainly would support it. Of course, as mentioned, the VFS issue has also surfaced since December. It was brought to my attention in December, so I thought it would be worthwhile for us to look at these issues in this study.

With that being said, if I'm understanding correctly from the clerk, while he's investigating the question about the adjournment of the debate on the amendment related to the subcommittee report, while he's sorting out the answer to that—

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Ms. Kwan, I have the clarification. He got the clarification.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Oh, do we? Okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I have that. There were some raised hands, so I just wanted to provide the opportunity for the members to speak. But I have the clarification, so once we are done with the list, we will proceed.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I was just going to say, if we can proceed to hear the witnesses, I think it's worthwhile to go ahead and do that, given that they're already here and we've already lost so much time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Ms. Kwan.

Ms. Dancho, did you want to speak?

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I do agree with Jenny in that regard, to go straight to the witnesses, and we can bookend the officials, if that works.

I just wanted to make the final point that amendments to subcommittee reports on the fly are very common. This is not an uncommon procedure amongst committees. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Ms. Dancho.

Ms. Martinez Ferrada.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

I just wanted to move to the witnesses, but it's fine. I'll lower my hand.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Okay.

I have the clarification from the clerk. Adjourning debate on the amendment means that the whole motion is adjourned, so the same committee must then proceed to another item of business.

I would propose...and ask for everyone's unanimous consent. The motion for the study of immigration and refugee measures for the people of Hong Kong was adopted last year by the committee. Based on that, without adopting the subcommittee report, we can proceed to hearing from the witnesses. As the witnesses are here, I think it would be in the interest of everyone that we proceed to hear from them.

Ms. Kwan, go ahead.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you.

On a very quick point of order, will the witnesses get a full hour? Will the committee get a full hour for our questions? I just want to clarify that because our time is all mixed up.