Evidence of meeting #2 for Indigenous and Northern Affairs in the 39th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was chair.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
I call the meeting to order.
You all have before you the agenda for today, which is pretty brief, and then as well the sample of routine motions, which in the past has typically been approved by committees at a meeting.
The very first one, if we can take a look at it—in no particular order, but these maybe are the quick, routine ones we can get at—is the services of the analysts from the Library of Parliament.
Do you move that, Anita?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
With the same wording as there? Okay.
Do we need a seconder for that? No? Okay.
So you've all had a chance to look at that. We're looking at the services of the analysts for the Library of Parliament, which is that the committee retain, as needed and at the discretion of the chair, the services of one or more analysts from the Library of Parliament to assist in its work.
(Motion agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
Okay, that one has been moved and adopted, so now Mary can step into her position here.
Do you want to at least say hello to us and introduce yourself? Marlisa is the other person who will be assisting and working with us in doing research. We appreciate her stepping up to the plate here; she's got considerable background and is primed and ready to go as well.
The way the last minority parliament shaped the subcommittee on agenda and procedure was that it be composed of the chair, the two vice-chairs, and a member of the other opposition party, which in this case would be the Bloc. Are there any other suggestions? Is that a fair and reasonable way to shape our subcommittee?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
Okay. Is there any discussion in respect to that? Is it okay by the Bloc and the NDP? Do I hear approval for that?
(Motion agreed to)
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
On the reduced quorum, the motion is that the chair be authorized to hold meetings to receive evidence and to have that evidence printed when a quorum is not present, provided that at least three members are present, including one member of the opposition.
The background to that is that sometimes it's a bit embarrassing if we have people come here from a distance and pay their expenses and make a great effort to have them here, and then because of conflicting schedules and so on, we don't have people here on time and we keep the witnesses waiting—or maybe we don't even establish quorum in the normal sense. So this motion allows the chair to proceed, if we wait a reasonable bit, to receive the evidence, and it allows it to be printed, provided that at least three members are present, including one member of the opposition. So there will be no funny games played with that.
Do we have any comments in respect to that?
Monsieur Lévesque.
Bloc
Yvon Lévesque Bloc Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC
Mr. Chairman, you refer to three members of the committee, at least one of whom must be from the opposition. Must those three committee members be the chair and the two vice-chairs?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
I was assuming that we meant including one member of the opposition.
What do we mean here? Can you help us in terms of what the understanding was the last time?
The Clerk of the Committee Mr. Roger Préfontaine
Well, there is no specification. We need a chair to start a meeting. The chair has to be here, in other words, because without quorum we cannot have a designated chair or an interim chair. The three would include the chair.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
So at a very minimum you would have the chair and a member from the government side, and you'd have to have at least one member of the opposition.
Liberal
Nancy Karetak-Lindell Liberal Nunavut, NU
I understood it to be any three members, because that's why we have vice-chairs. It could be Jean and two other members. In that case, I think I've seen cases where, of the three people who show up, one of them is designated as chair if for some odd reason the chair or the two vice-chairs don't show up. But you're there to listen to witnesses—and it should be the three, as long as one is from the opposition and someone is designated as chair. So I understood that to mean any three members, because it says “at least three members are present”, and it doesn't designate what positions have to be there; otherwise, it would defeat the purpose again.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
Yes, I think that's fair and I agree with that.
Is there some procedural technical reason why you talk in terms of a chair, or is there something we don't know?
The Clerk
No, but Nancy makes a good point. If the vice-chair is here and the members who are here wish to proceed, then the vice-chair would chair the meeting.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
There's no procedural requirement for the chair to be here that we know about from the Robert's Rules of Order point of view, is there?
Liberal
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
I assume so.
If we want to change that, it does say here, “That the Chair be authorized to hold meetings to receive evidence”. Is that right?
Liberal
Nancy Karetak-Lindell Liberal Nunavut, NU
But the definition of the chair, if you look in those, could be a designate, as far as I know. But I could be wrong.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Maurice Vellacott
We would want to be careful in these cases, because in the first one what does it mean when it says, “the committee retain, as needed and at the discretion of the Chair...”?
