Industry Committee on Dec. 1st, 2020

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Yes, I think MP Ehsassi pretty much said it. I definitely think Canadians deserve to know the context to understand why we're in the situation that we're in today, because a lot of them have a lot of difficulty understanding how Canada doesn't have the capacity to produce these vaccines. I think it's definitely something we need to look at.

The subamendment that was raised also really talks about how we can get to a point where we can fix the situation. I definitely think that, combined, these two amendments will make this a much better study.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

MP Masse.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

I just want to make sure that we're all clear. I don't have an objection to (e) provided that the main study that we're doing here will be on the specifics of the motion that we have before us. I take the point that Mr. Cumming is making that we don't want to, I guess, water down the main motion. I think as long as we're all under the same impression here that the focus is going to be on (a) through (d), then part of (e) would happen anyway.

I think it will be interesting. There will be lots of subjects that will come up. There have already been books written about this, and how we can get back there is actually a pretty straightforward path. I don't even know how much we're going to get from witnesses for that. Are we going to get some historians or philosophers?

At any rate, I support the motion, but as long as it stays focused, I don't have a problem with the subamendment. I think it could offer some value because it's going to come out a little bit anyway. But we need to focus on the specifics here for all of our interests.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Thank you very much.

MP Masse, is there any further debate on the subamendment?

Seeing none, I will ask if we are all in favour, but I'm not sure....

I'm just going to refer to the clerk. Do we want to do a recorded vote or can we just go by a show of hands? Okay.

I'll just start with if it's unanimous. Is it the will of the committee?

All in favour of the subamendment?

I do not see unanimous consent. Hold on. My apologies, as I can't see all of your hands. I cannot see the room. I'm going to ask the clerk if he can do the recorded division just because it's very difficult to distinguish between the room and the....

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Sherry, why not do it in the same way that the Speaker asks for nays in the House? If it's not unanimous, why doesn't somebody chip in with a nay? Then we don't have to have a recorded vote. A recorded vote is fine, but in the interests of time, it might make sense if somebody doesn't agree with the subamendment to say nay, and we can then do a recorded division. We could whip through it a bit faster that way.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Okay. If it is the will of the committee, all in favour?

Again, could you put your hands up.

Opposed?

(Amendment agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

For everyone's information, only Mr. Sloan and myself are in the room. You can see me. Mr. Sloan voted for the motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Thank you very much, Mr. Lemire.

I can't really see the room, so I can't see you very well.

We'll now go to the amendment as amended. Is there any further debate on it? The motion now reads, with paragraph (e), “the evolution of Canada's domestic vaccine manufacturing capacity and the steps Canada can and should take to address it”.

(Subamendment agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Is there any further debate on the now amended motion?

MP Erskine-Smith.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

I have a question for James on order for ministers to attend. This is for the ministers to appear separately, and there's a proviso that if they don't attend, the committee ought to refer it to the House. I've not seen that before. Is there a precedent for doing this? I understand where witnesses don't attend and then the committee reconvenes and says, “Well, the witness hasn't attended”, and then issues some statement or refers it to the House. Is it normal to have...? In five years I've never seen it, so I'm just curious. It's a bit pointed, I would say, as far as it goes, and to pass something like this unanimously, it might be helpful to soften the edges of it a bit. I think the ministers are amendable to attending, so perhaps we can amend it in some way so that there is not this implicit suggestion that if they're not going to attend, we're going to take some forceful action.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

We have MP Lambropoulos, and then MP Cumming.

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Thank you.

I would just ask about the timing of the study. There's not much mention about timing. We say four meetings, but we are already in December and currently we have until 11 December, I believe, to continue our committee meetings in a hybrid way. We should take that into account as well.

Some parts of the country, such as mine, are in code red lockdown, and although we can come to Ottawa, if we are going to have a chance to spend Christmas with our families, we need to quarantine for one week prior. I just want to take into account those types of restrictions if we are going to go ahead with the study.

As it is an emergency study, it would take precedence over any other study we are doing, and that makes sense, but I just wonder what Mr. Cumming and the Conservatives were thinking in terms of timing and when we would get this study completed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Thank you very much, MP Lambropoulos.

MP Cumming.

[James Cumming, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

There are a couple of things.

Mr. Erskine-Smith, the intent of the motion was to put some teeth to it to make sure that we can advance as quickly as possible. It might not be the standard language, but the intent was to make sure that we can get going on this.

It's my understanding that there is an issue with the ability to have meetings after December 19, so I think it's pressing that we should be to try to wrap this up before December 19 if possible.

There is something online that hybrid committees can't meet after December 19. My understanding is that it's a technical issue, that there are some upgrades being made to the services, the servers and that type of thing, so the intent of the motion is to try to move this as quickly as possible.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Thank you very much.

I'm just going to clarify one point for the members. Currently, the motion that is before the House that allows us to sit in a hybrid fashion goes only until December 11, not December 19, so in order for this committee to meet after December 11, it would have to be in person, unless there is a motion in the House adopted allowing us to do so. I want to make sure that folks understand that we have three meetings remaining between now and December 11, as currently scheduled. Any additional meetings to be added after that would have to be in person, unless there is an order in the House allowing us to sit in a hybrid fashion.

MP Jowhari is next.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'm sure the chair and the clerk have had a conversation prior to this. With this motion adopted, how would the committee schedule look given the fact that we are proposing to invite three different ministers, each for three hours, separately, with the number of sessions we are left with and December 11 fast approaching?

If such a conversation has taken place, I would appreciate getting an update on how our schedule would look, given that we move forward with this, and also on the viability of being able to get three ministers for three hours in three separate sessions. What will happen to the other witnesses we want to be able to bring? If we are limited to three meetings and all those meetings will be consumed by the ministers, how are we going to get the witnesses into that?

I would appreciate some feedback on it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Thank you so much.

Before I turn to MP Lemire, I'll just explain that this motion has not been adopted yet, so we have not invited anyone until it is the will of the committee to proceed. Then we will invite witnesses accordingly.

We have three meetings scheduled between now and December 11, and my understanding is that there are no additional slots available to accommodate additional meetings between now and December 11.

However, if this motion is adopted and it is the will the committee to commence this immediately, we will reach out to the witnesses who have been asked. There are four witnesses identified, and three meetings left. Therefore, obviously, in order to get those folks in, we would need to pair up some additional witnesses, again depending on the availability.

It's something the clerk and I would work on immediately once it's passed and is the will of the committee.

That's just to explain that we cannot invite witnesses until a motion is actually adopted in this committee.

I'll turn to MP Lemire.

The floor is yours, Mr. Lemire

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I just wanted to explain the Quebec government's rules.

Technically, you have to be in quarantine for a week before December 24, if you want to be able to visit your family. That would bring us to December 17. So it would be possible for me to meet in person, here in Ottawa, on December 14, 15, or 16. Even though Parliament is closed, it would not prevent us from being able to take part in the work of the committee.

As for the number of meetings, that would depend on the will of the committee. I should mention that we wanted to propose other topics. The emergency motion is certainly going to make us use up all our time today. I was counting on today to really be able to report on Internet access, and on Bell representatives being here. You know that I find this issue extremely important. I wanted to show you how much of an impact it could have on the motion we have already passed.

Can we meet with the representatives from Bell earlier than scheduled? If not, I will live with it. We are in the politics business, not the certainty business. Unexpected things happen, but this issue concerns me and I would like the committee to recognize that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Thank you very much, Mr. Lemire.

Yes, indeed, we were scheduled to meet with witnesses in sessions that we have moved today, in order to deal with this emergency motion pursuant to Standing Order 106(4). So the decision is the committee's. If the committee wants to push the other study back to next year, that is what we will do. In this specific case, it's really up to the committee to decide, and the clerk and I will act accordingly.

Is there any additional debate?

MP Masse.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

I have a couple of quick points.

I support the wording as it is, because we don't have time to have another meeting to try to force things to happen. I know it's a bit more direct, with the path, but that's because of the time that we have in those three meetings. We don't need to have another meeting to try to get the things going again.

I do support returning and finishing the rural broadband study later on. I'll just remind everyone that this committee—and I think there were a couple of members who were here—passed a rural broadband study unanimously just a few years ago and most of those recommendations were never followed through on. A lot of work has been done on that and there are some things that could happen. I do support finishing up that work, and then moving on. Mr. Lemire is making a good point because we have invested in it, but with the timing of the stuff, I support it as it stands.

Lastly, there's no way we can meet in person.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

MP Ehsassi.

[Ali Ehsassi, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Just having heard from everyone and the challenges that we're facing, given there are only a few time slots left and the reality that the members from Quebec have to go into quarantine, I was wondering if I could bring a second amendment, which would say that each of the ministers do not have to appear separately.

I think perhaps that would allow us to expedite the work on this study and ensure that all of the clerks and the members are capable of doing this in a timely fashion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Okay, we have an amendment on the floor.

I see MP Jowhari has his hand up.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

I definitely support that amendment.

If we have three ministers and three meetings left and if we get the three of them coming in for one hour each, or all three of them at the same time for one meeting, that leaves us with two other meetings where we could bring other witnesses, given that I'm sure other party members also want to put their witnesses forward. That would be a workable schedule and we'd then finish, hopefully, before December 11, so we don't have to go into post-December 11 and the challenges that would be there. I definitely think that's a great amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

MP Dreeshen.

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer—Mountain View, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I think it's critical that we be able to speak to any minister separately. We've seen in the last little while cases in which two ministers would come, and the discussions would then end up becoming confused somewhat.

I think it's very important, however we do it, that it be one minister at a time, so that we can all direct our questions specifically to that minister. Keep their speaking time limited to five minutes or whatever to just get the general high points that they feel we need to have.

Certainly, any kind of combination that would put two ministers together when we try to discuss this is going to be counter-productive. It ends up pushing one back and forth, the discussion between one minister and the other, or to their both wishing to talk about something and running out the clock.

I think it's important, then, that whatever we finally end up with is with only one minister at a time.