Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Oct. 13th, 2020

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. Naaman Sugrue]

Honourable members of the committee, I see a quorum.

I must inform members that the clerk of the committee can receive motions only for the election of the chair.

The clerk cannot receive other motions, cannot entertain points of order nor participate in debate.

We can now proceed to the election of the chair.

Pursuant to Standing Order 106(2), the chair must be a member of the government party. I am ready to receive motions for the chair.

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

I would like to move that Bob Bratina be the chair of the committee.

[The Clerk]

Are there any further motions for the election of the chair?

Pursuant to the House order of Wednesday, September 23, I will now proceed to a recorded division.

(Motion agreed to: yeas 12; nays 0)

I declare the motion carried and Bob Bratina to be duly elected chair of the committee.

I invite Bob Bratina to take the chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thank you very much, everyone.

Thanks to the previous group of members. We had quite a remarkable, although truncated, session, and I was really pleased with how we got along.

I'm encouraged by the new members who are joining us now. Thank you very much for showing your willingness to participate in what we think is a very vital committee with important work to do.

My next order of business is to hear nominations for the first vice-chair of the committee. The nomination will be by the Conservatives.

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

I nominate Cathy McLeod.

[The Clerk]

It has been moved by Mr. Vidal that Cathy McLeod be elected first vice-chair of the committee.

Are there any further motions for first vice-chair?

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

If you need a second for that, I'll second the motion.

[The Clerk]

It has been moved by Mr. Vidal that Cathy McLeod be elected first vice-chair of the committee.

Pursuant to the House Order of Wednesday, September 23, 2020, I will now proceed to a recorded division.

[Sylvie Bérubé, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

May I speak? Someone was supposed to nominate me, Mr. Chair.

[The Clerk]

I believe it will be for the position of second vice-chair, Ms. Bérubé. First we will elect the first vice-chair. Then we will elect the second vice-chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

We're only doing the first vice-chair.

[The Clerk]

First we will proceed with the election of the first vice-chair.

(Motion agreed to: yeas 11; nays 0)

I declare the motion carried and Cathy McLeod elected first vice-chair of the committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thank you.

Welcome, Cathy.

Next we have the election and we require a nomination for second vice-chair, a member of the Bloc.

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

Mr. Chair, I would like to nominate Sylvie Bérubé to be second vice-chair of the committee.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

I will second the nomination of Madame Bérubé for second vice-chair.

[The Clerk]

Pursuant to Standing Order 106(2), the second vice-chair must be a member of an opposition party other than the official opposition.

It has been moved by Mr. Anandasangaree that Ms. Bérubé be elected as second vice-chair of the committee.

Are there any further motions?

Pursuant to the House order of Wednesday, September 23, 2020, I will now proceed to a recorded division.

(Motion agreed to: yeas 11; nays 0)

[The Clerk]

I declare the motion carried and Ms. Sylvie Bérubé duly elected second vice-chair of the committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thank you very much and welcome again, Madame Bérubé.

I've had a request for a nomination for a third vice-chair. I'll ask Mr. van Koeverden to make that nomination.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to nominate Ms. Mumilaaq Qaqqaq as the third vice-chair.

[The Clerk]

I'll interrupt for a moment. If we could suspend briefly, I would like to confer with the chair for a moment.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

I have a quick point of order, and perhaps it could be part of the conferring. I don't object, but I wonder if there are issues here with the Standing Orders. Do any Standing Orders need to change for us to proceed?

[The Clerk]

My advice to the committee is that this could be done at any other time. I would need to come back to the committee after doing some research as to whether or not this could be done in a formal way. As Mrs. McLeod points out, the Standing Orders stipulate a number of chair positions for committees, and to my knowledge PROC did not report back to the House on that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Mr. Clerk, we've had some discussion leading up to this. I'll ask Mr. Anandasangaree to reflect on what we determined.

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

Mr. Clerk, the understanding I have is that the committee is able to establish a third vice-chair if it so pleases. The challenge is that the Board of Internal Economy does not have the proper resources to offer a stipend to the third vice-chair. That is the understanding I have.

Ms. Blaney, I think you may have faced this in other areas. As the whip of the NDP, I don't know if you're able to weigh in on this. Our understanding is that what we are doing is completely within our purview. The only issue here is the stipend that is often offered to the first and second vice-chairs.

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

I can add to this conversation. First of all, this is unexpected. I didn't expect this conversation. It is one that happened at PROC. Of course, because of prorogation, it was not able to move forward. I don't have any answers about the Board of Internal Economy. I do agree that one of the biggest concerns we had was, of course, not about the stipend but about the reality of vice-chairs and chairs. They are often sent information from stakeholder groups, and because one of the parties is not recognized as a vice-chair, they often are not attached in those information exchanges.

That is all I can add to the conversation. It is something, of course, that we continue to deal with. I can't answer what the committee can do. That is at the discretion of the committee. However, I would of course be happy to support it.