Evidence of meeting #50 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was amendment.
A recording is available from Parliament.
The Clerk
Let's say the chair rules an amendment inadmissible and the committee decides to overrule the chair. There's always the possibility that a member could raise a point of order in the House at report stage and seek the advice of the Speaker. The Speaker would then turn to the same advice I have given and rule accordingly, depending on how he or she feels.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
Okay. Your comment was that after second reading the bill is set in stone. I'm trying to think, in all my time here, how many bills have ever been sent to a committee before second reading. It's probably 0%, or close to 0%, so it does present a certain issue.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
There is another thing I would like to comment on. I'm not being critical of the chair. Honestly, I'm not. He has to deal with what he has to deal with. However, for all the testimony we have heard over—I don't know how many meetings—six or eight meetings, should we now advise the people appearing before committee that if they're talking about this, that, or the other thing, they may as well not even bother showing up because any of the suggestions they make about the legislation are going to be ruled inadmissible?
It's a good discussion, and if they get off track, it's almost the chair's job, the clerk's job, or the analyst's job to remind everybody, “Hey, you're getting off track. There's no point in even talking about it.” It's really just a waste of time in some manner.
Those are just a few points I was going to provide.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
I want to reinforce one point. I have challenged the chair in previous committee business in this Parliament, and one would hope that if your colleagues believe the chair has ruled something inadmissible which is not, the natural alternative would be to go to their peers on the committee, because we are masters of own destinies. The other alternative, as suggested, is to bring it up with the Speaker and to appeal to the Speaker at report stage. There are mechanisms to make sure that these efforts are made.
When we have witnesses come forward, I believe strongly that they should be able to give their opinions. It may not always be directly related to the business before the committee, but as parliamentarians we always benefit from hearing different voices, even if we disagree with them, and even when we agree with them but it's not on the subject at hand.
I appreciate all the contributions today, and I look forward to continuing this.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
I thank Mr. Albas for appearing at committee today. I'm glad he's not in our committee all the time, but I do appreciate his comments.
NDP
Brian Masse NDP Windsor West, ON
I know it's going to be ruled out of scope, but I think you've seen an intent here to give the minister some powers. This is discretionary, by the way. It can be a fine of one dollar, or it can be a fine of up to $1 million. We're trying to give the bill some teeth.
I know that this will be inadmissible. I'm not going to challenge the chair on that, because there has been a repertoire of amendments related to these types of issues.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Dan Ruimy
Thank you.
You are correct. That is inadmissible as it amends a section of the act not amended by the bill.
Finally, we have Mr. Masse again, with NDP-6.
NDP
Brian Masse NDP Windsor West, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
This one is an important one with bearer shares. We heard some testimony on this and we are dealing with some of this in the act, which is important for getting more openness and transparency related to bearer shares.
To remind people, bearer shares are basically like unaccounted-for money in our system that's often been cited for being used for organized crime, money laundering, and so forth. Canada has become known basically as a “snow washing” destination for money laundering. We had great testimony.
The testimony from Claire Woodside summed this up with. She said:
The elimination of bearer shares has been identified domestically and internationally as a key step in efforts to increase beneficial ownership transparency. Regrettably, the current drafting of Bill C-25 will not permit the misuse of existing bearer shares; nor will it eliminate the shares, as has been stated within government. The current text of the bill prohibits the issuance of new bearer shares—
That's good. We have that advantage. She continued:
—and allows for the voluntary conversion of existing bearer shares but does not require that individuals who hold bearer shares register those shares before exercising the rights attached to them.
What it does is allow whoever has them, some of them through the criminal elements and syndicates, to cash in those that are sitting and floating around when they want; as opposed to if you're actually going to use those shares, you have to register them now. It's a way of registering all money so, for example, we don't have free-floating cash in our society that's unaccounted for. If you want to try to exercise the use of those, which were supposedly issued at the time under the law to be used for legal and meaningful purposes, you should have no problem wanting to register those numbers.
I'm sorry, the parliamentary secretary is interrupting, so I'll give him the floor if he likes.
Liberal
David Lametti Liberal LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC
I'm sorry about that. I just said it was before 1975.
NDP
Brian Masse NDP Windsor West, ON
That's okay. If you wanted to add something, I'm happy to....
This will provide that closure of the loophole, and we did have several testify on it. Canada is one of the last G7 countries to be finishing the deal on this. This is what this amendment does; it simply puts the registration at the forefront of those shares and makes them basically revenue in Canada that is going to be accounted for.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Dan Ruimy
Thank you.
Unfortunately, this one is also inadmissible as it amends a section of the act not amended by the bill.
We're going to move on to PV-4.
Ms. May.
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
PV-4 is in clause 7. Did you want to do clause 6 first?
Green
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Oh, I'm sorry, I just didn't think you were going to move to clause 7 until you decided if clause 6 was carried.