Industry Committee on Oct. 19th, 2010

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I find I may have to disagree with the mover of the motion. We've heard from expert witnesses today who have nothing to gain or lose by saying that this amendment--and its two or three subamendments that we have--isn't relevant. It won't make a bit of difference whether that number is 25 or 96, or whatever the number is. It will not affect the performance in that area. We've heard that from these individuals. I don't understand why my colleagues from across the way want to add more bureaucracy.

I spend much of my time on the finance committee, and we hear over and over again that if there is one thing government should be doing, it's to get out of the way and reduce the red tape. Here we are adding more. Some people may say it interferes with provincial jurisdiction. The door is open on our future amendment to talk about another area, not the electricity piece. Mr. Cotton has said he has been willing to discuss that issue in terms of maybe there being something we could do in that area. They are very clear that this amendment will not have any effect. It is inappropriate and I'm not voting for it, and I can't believe that in this day and age anyone in this government, on any side you sit on, is looking to add more bureaucracy to the Government of Canada.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Wallace.

Mr. Lake.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

I'm going to further the comments made by Mr. Wallace.

First of all, in terms of looking at the amendment itself, I don't even think grammatically it makes any sense. In the way it's worded right now, it's just a throw-on at the end of a paragraph in a place that doesn't make any sense, so it would have to be reworked even to make sense within the original amendment. I still don't think it adds anything to the amendment.

I do think what we've seen so far is an argument for more bureaucracy. All this does is adds more bureaucracy, as Mike mentioned. It's funny, we didn't compare notes or anything but I had written down, more red tape, more cost, more bureaucracy. That's all we're talking about here. Even the mover of the original amendment, Mr. McTeague, did acknowledge that it may be redundant, which is the definition of “red tape”.

We have heard from the expert witness who has nothing to gain from this. He's not in a partisan position in any way. These are experts who have worked under governments of different stripes, and he's giving his honest feedback that this adds nothing to the legislation. It seems like we're throwing in a kind of random or ad hoc amendment to a bill here that doesn't add anything to it. I don't think I've heard one bit of rationale that makes sense. I haven't heard an argument for it. We certainly didn't have any witnesses come before the committee actually arguing for this, so I'm not sure why we're going through this exercise. It doesn't make any sense to me.

Maybe we could have Mr. McTeague actually tell us about the witnesses he has heard from. Whether he heard from them at committee or whether he heard from them in his office, name the people who have come to him saying they need this change, because we haven't heard that yet.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Lake. I'm certain he'll do that right after Mr. Braid.

[Peter Braid, Conservative, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I was just simply going to raise the concern about potential intrusion into areas of provincial responsibility, which my colleague Mr. Wallace did in a superbly articulate way, so I'll just leave it at that.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you.

Mr. McTeague.

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

Chair, I would certainly like to open up and welcome a discussion on compliance rates with Measurement Canada, which is what the government ought to have done, as opposed to picking and targeting and slandering one particular sector of the gas retail in this country.

I point out a comment that was made by Measurement Canada. In 2009 Measurement Canada was asked to estimate the impact of measurement and accuracy for fuel dispensers. The question is why didn't the government ask for you to look at quarry and sandpits, 47% accuracy rate? Why didn't they ask you to do metal scrap or perhaps fruit and vegetable, at 83%? Why didn't they do chemical products, at 62.2%?

Mr. Lake and others may dismiss the fact that electricity rates are only accurate to the tune of 74.19%, but that's one quarter missing, by your own analysis from Measurement Canada. So let's not get caught into the argument of why witnesses were not brought forward. They were specifically to go after the retail gasoline industry.

I'm suggesting if you really want to be honest in terms of your approach on the accuracy question, you would have gone after all industries, and I'd be quite willing to extend those discussions, Mr. Wallace and others, into looking at all the other inaccuracies.

I can tell you, Chair, the concern that I have is this. If it was not validated by the comments that were made here, it's certainly the result of the information that suggests we have a lot of work to do, and there had better be uniformity and there had better be uniformity quickly, because it's consumers' money that's being played here. As the Liberal Party, we want to make sure that there is uniformity and that Canadians can expect that when they buy something they are actually getting what they pay for, as opposed to going to an industry that has a pretty damned good track record, notwithstanding the hyperbole.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. McTeague.

Mr. Masse.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Chair, I'll be supporting the amendment. I sat on a utilities commission for a number of different years, and I think the most compelling evidence we have is that there is an accreditation process. I think Mr. Cotton has done a good job of making a case, but at the same time I wouldn't object if there were a so-called—and I'm using the words of Mr. Cotton—formalization process for that accreditation. For that reason I'll be voting for the amendment.

I don't think it would create undue costs and burdens and so forth. What it would do, I think, is provide a little more prescribed formula, which would be done by the department itself.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Masse.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

Could we get a recorded vote on this?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Yes.

We're going to go to the subamendment first. The only one that was in order was the one Mr. Rota moved. We'll read that again: “and for greater certainty, in each particular sector” is added on to the original amendment.

Would you like me to read it in full?

[An hon. member]

It's making sense so far.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Okay.

It's simply at the end of what is printed in front of you, “and for greater certainty, in each particular sector”.

(Subamendment negatived: nays 7; yeas 4)

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

We'll now go to the original amendment for a recorded vote as well.

I'm just making sure that my clerk's pen is as fast as my voice.

(Amendment negatived: nays 7; yeas 4)

(Clause 5 agreed to on division)

All right, now clause 6.

Mr. Lake.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, what are we going to do?

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

We're going to clause 6 right now.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

I know. I just wondered if we should go to clause 16 first, since we just spent all this time having this discussion, and clause 16 kind of carries on naturally from the discussion we were just having. Can we do that?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

We can if I can find some agreement.

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

Agreed, and we'll come back to it.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Mr. Masse, you're fine with that?

Okay, we'll go to clause 16.

There is amendment LIB-4. Is that correct?

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

Yes, that's correct.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Mr. McTeague.

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

I have no further comments on this. I think Mr. Cotton has suggested...and others have said enough on this. We stand by this amendment.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Mr. Lake.