Evidence of meeting #2 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was chair.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Liberal
Dan McTeague Liberal Pickering—Scarborough East, ON
I'm wondering if there is a flexibility with Mr. Carrie. I would prefer to have the old wording with the addition of child care expenses.
Conservative
Colin Carrie Conservative Oshawa, ON
It is.
I do believe that there was the wording “as established by the Board of Internal Economy” for reasonable travel, and it clarified that there are certain rules we have in the Board of Internal Economy for travel. With the status quo there could be expenses outside of this that, for one reason or another, witnesses may try to take advantage of, and it was to keep it in the box of what we work by.
November 15th, 2007 / 10:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
There are two changes, as I understand it. Number one is “as established by the Board of Internal Economy”, and the second is child care expenses.
Conservative
Bruce Stanton Conservative Simcoe North, ON
The other item is this issue of additional witnesses beyond the two. The weakness in the last session's routine motion is that it really leaves a fairly broad range for I don't know who. I guess it's at the discretion of the chair to decide when exceptional circumstances require more than two witnesses. The new proposed routine motion for this particular area in fact gives more clarity on that point, and it says there should be two. As with anything under committee business, the committee has the ability, if those exceptional circumstances exist, to deal with that, and if they come up we can make a decision to allow more than two. But in fact we've given more clear direction on that particular point, and it doesn't leave the chair of the committee with the unilateral decision to decide when they can add a third, fourth, or more witnesses without the consent of the committee. I'm not taking anything away from the chair's ability to make these good judgments on behalf of the committee, but nevertheless I think it clears the issue up.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
Okay. Thank you.
Is there anyone else on this point?
Mr. McTeague.
Liberal
Dan McTeague Liberal Pickering—Scarborough East, ON
I have an overarching concern about the question of flexibility to allow the chair the discretion to allow more than just one, and we're not too exercised over this, but I think there should be some wording that doesn't limit this up to a maximum of two representatives. If you remove that, we're fine with the change.
Liberal
Dan McTeague Liberal Pickering—Scarborough East, ON
Start from “living expenses to be reimbursed to witnesses who are invited to appear before the Committee”.
Conservative
Liberal
Dan McTeague Liberal Pickering—Scarborough East, ON
Yes.
The issue there is the removal of the discretion that's given to the chair to have more than two witnesses paid for, and I think that's.... Normally, as a committee we wouldn't even worry about this, because it looks pretty obvious, but this etches this in stone, and I don't want to have us come back to an unlikely scenario where we have more than two.
I'm looking for the flexibility here, Mr. Chair.
Conservative
Colin Carrie Conservative Oshawa, ON
I believe the committee can do what it wants with unanimous consent, and it does give that certainty. It has the box, and then outside the box we would all have to agree on that. It said “as established by the Board of Internal Economy” because they've figured out what we should be paying as a government, and it just keeps it. It's a nice conservative thing to put in there.
Liberal
Liberal
Dan McTeague Liberal Pickering—Scarborough East, ON
Oh, I understand full well. But what if I'm having a grumpy day? I mean, I've got five kids, you've got four, or three....
Conservative
Bruce Stanton Conservative Simcoe North, ON
Mr. Chair, there's ample opportunity for the committee to have those kinds of decisions put in front of them. We meet twice a week. For a decision like that, or a matter of committee business, it can generally....
I don't know what the history has been with this committee, but certainly in my short experience here in committee work, for a quick decision on something like that there's certainly no harm in putting it in front of the committee. The process of gathering witnesses and scheduling--that can be put in front of the committee at the end of a meeting quickly, and away we go. But it does at least require that the chair bring that to the committee for their discussion instead of just deciding.
Again, I'm not taking anything away from you, Mr. Chair, but really the committee should be in the driver's seat on this one.
NDP
Peggy Nash NDP Parkdale—High Park, ON
I support the offer of child care expenses.
I'm wondering what the motivation is behind the change here, taking away the discretion of the chair. Has there been a problem with the chair of this committee not exercising the proper discretion in this regard? Is there a problem that we're trying to fix here?
If the goal is that it normally be limited to two, but that the chair has flexibility, that seems to me a reasonable way to handle that. I'm just wondering if there's a particular problem that we're trying to fix.