Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Feb. 18th, 2020

[Gary Vidal, Conservative, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

That sends it to committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Your motion is done to discuss future business in the committee. What's before the committee is Jaime's motion that we move forward with this.

For further clarification, I believe the issue that the subcommittee will deal with is the contrast of the two presented before us. Having passed that motion, it seems to me that the matter will sit with the subcommittee, and we'll go from there.

I have Mr. van Koeverden to speak next.

Go ahead.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to everybody for their contributions.

After having a quick word with my colleague, Mr. Battiste, I think it's really important that, in the spirit of coming together, if we are going to proceed with something like a blanket exercise or with a variety of exercises in the hopes of education and becoming a little more enlightened on issues that many of us have not faced throughout our lives, it be unanimous on the part of the committee. If it's irreconcilable, we should not proceed, because if we don't find consensus there, then I think it's unlikely that we'll find consensus elsewhere, and the work that we have been charged with, the obligation to proceed here, will require us to come together as a committee.

It's my view, and I believe it's shared by Mr. Battiste, that, if it is not unanimous, we not proceed with any of those activities.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

What we have before us is that the subcommittee will present to the full committee, at which time we would consider the notion of unanimity.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

In our discussion, Chair, I asked that, if we were to move on it at subcommittee and, say, on Tuesday, before we start the agenda, would it be possible to do that blanket ceremony or some combination?

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

It's about 90 minutes to two hours.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

We have two hours in our committee that we could use for Tuesday, and then, if the subcommittee so chooses, we start whatever study we're going to do on Thursday. Maybe our NDP friend has another idea, but the subcommittee is charged with this. Could it be done on Tuesday, just hypothetically? Yes, okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

We don't have an issue then.

What we need to do for process is to pass a motion that the committee take part in a blanket exercise at the Tuesday meeting subsequent to this meeting.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

No, the committee's going to debate that. What I was asking is, if the subcommittee were to approve that on Thursday, is it feasible to have it ready to go on Tuesday? That's just for planning. If we're going to decide how to get the committee going and what we're going to move on if, in our minds, Tuesday is a possibility, then we'll just basically—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

The main committee has to accept the recommendation of the subcommittee, so that creates a timing problem for what Mr. Battiste wants to do.

Gary.

[Gary Anandasangaree, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON]

At least in principle, it would appear that we have agreement that we will have a blanket ceremony, amongst others. If it's okay with everyone, then we schedule that in for Tuesday and this committee can vote on it right now. We will have a planning meeting on Thursday in which we will discuss the motions as well as other ceremonies that could be incorporated as part of what we're going for. I think in terms of timing, practically, the whole committee needs to agree to this, and I don't think we will have an opportunity before Tuesday to have that agreement.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Could we just vote on it Tuesday morning? It will take 10 seconds. I don't want to over-complicate it.

[Gary Anandasangaree, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON]

My understanding is, if it's a blanket ceremony, the set-up of the room and everything will be quite different. I think the idea is that it's a less formal exercise and an exercise that doesn't involve our being in somewhat of an adversarial position.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

Going back to the motion that just passed, it already spoke to this being discussed at subcommittee, so we can't go there until we've had that discussion. I don't believe so. I think that's why that motion went in that direction, because we heard from a member of the NDP who had concerns about that. I think, again, it needs to be discussed in that setting first before we make blanket commitments about ceremonies. I think that needs to be a discussion in subcommittee first.

[Gary Anandasangaree, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON]

With great respect, I believe that the committee is able to make those decisions, notwithstanding the motion that was passed. The motion that was passed specifically involves studies that this committee is going to undertake, and this proposal is not an actual study. This is more of an exercise, so there is a distinction.

In the spirit of moving forward as a committee with one of the first things we're going to do, we will move forward with a subcommittee discussion on Thursday of what our study priorities will be amongst the parties and then we propose—and I think there is an actual motion on the table, which can be voted on—to have a blanket ceremony on Tuesday, next Tuesday.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Jamie.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

In light of everything, if we don't want to hold it up, do you want me to move the motion, or are you going to move the motion, that we approve the blanket ceremony on Tuesday? I don't know if that's from you or Gary or....

Jaime, do you want to do that?

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

I'm hoping to come to a consensus on this, the blanket exercise. If it's not done with consensus and it isn't done by all of us who want to learn, who want to share, who want to take part in something that helps us over the next two years with the issues that we're going to discuss, then I would take it off the floor. I want to see that it's done by consensus or not done at all.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

I have Mr. Viersen and Ms. Qaqqaq.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

I was just going to make the point that the second motion we passed here was that there be a subcommittee on agenda and procedure. All this discussion that we're having right now is for that committee, the subcommittee on agenda and procedure. It's supposed to set the agenda for our meetings going forward. That's the appropriate place for this discussion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

We'll hear Ms. Qaqqaq and then Mr. Zimmer.

[Mumilaaq Qaqqaq, NDP, Nunavut, NU]

Thank you. If we're going to start off in a good way, I don't think a good way to start off is an exercise that doesn't include all indigenous groups and solely focuses on first nations individuals. Also, it's not a ceremony. It's an exercise, and that's what I mean when we're talking about tokenism, and looking to me—again, this is what I'm trying to say—is like me asking you, with whatever your background is, to do work that I can also contribute to.

To ask me for a list of recommendations, sure, I'm okay to do that, but my point is that we all need to make a commitment to being invested in learning. In saying that, I don't think it's a good way to start off, with an exercise that focuses on first nations groups and excludes Inuit and Métis, so I don't agree with doing the exercise.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Mr. Zimmer.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

I think we want to support what your intent is. Again, we just don't want to cause an offence unintentionally. We like where you're going for that purpose.

Maybe you can explain—

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

I move to withdraw. If the NDP does not support training as a starting point for discussion on indigenous history, then I don't need to move forward on it. I will respect Ms. Qaqqaq's thoughts on this, and perhaps we'll have a conversation some other time and we can come back to the committee with some kind of consensus on an appropriate mechanism that would take into consideration all aboriginal peoples in Canada—Inuit, Métis and first nations.

So with that, I withdraw.