Evidence of meeting #3 for Subcommittee on International Human Rights in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was witnesses.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Peter Fonseca
What I did hear is that we are open to having six minutes of introductory remarks from witnesses instead of the usual 10.
Conservative
David Sweet Conservative Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON
Mr. Chair, from what I've heard here and the agreement, we should, if my colleagues agree with me, empower you to do the math on the clock and divvy up the time once the opening remarks are done, maybe with rotation for rotation's sake, so that whatever the remainder is, it's equally shared among members.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
I would trust you as chair on some of these things. One of the witnesses I'm going to propose is the academic who did the research that was the basis of the Associated Press story. In terms of giving him the time he needs and using whatever facilities to actually be able to go through and show us the data that was the basis of that study, I think it will be important for you to be able to evaluate the right mix of witnesses on panels. There may be cases where the six minutes makes more sense and there may be cases where it doesn't make sense.
I lost track a little bit of where we were in terms of the number of meetings and times over the day. I completely agree with what Iqra said about trying to build on what was already done. I also feel that having a substantial number of meetings to do that building work is important.
Liberal
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Right, so there was consensus around that. Basically, we'd have three panels each day. Each of those three panels would be over a two-hour meeting. We would have nominally six separate meetings. At each meeting we would have one panel of about three.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Peter Fonseca
Okay.
To go back to the witnesses and the introductory remarks of six or 10 minutes or whatever, and the flexibility there, who would decide, and how would the witnesses know that in terms of the remarks they're putting together they would have six or 10 minutes or somewhere in between? How would we do that?
Conservative
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Peter Fonseca
No, what I'm saying is that we will have to reach out to the witnesses. How do we know which witnesses will need more time? As you just said, you're going to have somebody from the Associated Press come in. I don't know if it would be better to have them do six or 10 minutes. How will we manage that?
Mr. Sweet.
Conservative
David Sweet Conservative Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON
Chair, it's been my experience, although there may be exceptions, that if somebody will be coming in with some some substantive evidence, as obviously this one particular witness will be, then generally speaking they will be on a panel that's smaller. As well, as we just said about empowering you, if he's pressed for time and there's more that he needs to do, and he needs another five or 10 minutes, I'd be glad to give up my time if it means a more substantive presentation. Oftentimes, we do that anyway when somebody comes in and they're not as savvy with the committee. Many of our members just tell them to go ahead and finish their points. I think we can work with that pretty well. If he has some AV that he says he absolutely has to throw up there, then I think we can communicate that to the committee and see if we can have an exception.
So I would keep them all to that time. Look, if you notify somebody and tell them six minutes, and they get 10, then it's a bonus.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Peter Fonseca
That's what I was going to ask the clerk.
When we notify witnesses, do we tell them that it's six minutes or 10 minutes or whatever for the remarks they draft? At the committees I've sat on, they get it almost right to the second.
The Clerk
It would be up to the members of the subcommittee and how many witnesses they submit to me. Typically, I would take that list of witnesses, create a master list, and work with the analysts to divide them into panels based on their expertise and who goes well together. At that time, we would see; if there were three or four witnesses per panel, I would adjust accordingly and tell them they have six or 10 minutes for an opening statement.
All of that is to say that if the witnesses came to me faster, then I would know faster.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Peter Fonseca
That leads us into when we want the deadline to be for witnesses—Tuesday or Wednesday next week?
Liberal
Iqra Khalid Liberal Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON
I mean, I would want to get in touch with some of the stakeholders in my area just to make sure they're okay and see if they have any recommendations. Obviously, we don't want to just keep referring to the same people again and again.
So I would like a little bit more time. Maybe Monday or Tuesday would be better for me.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
One practice I've seen at committees is to have a kind of rolling list where we can submit witnesses to the clerk. Given the tight timelines, I think it's probably important for that process of identification and assessment of availability to begin right away, but even later next week, if suddenly a name comes in and a member thinks, “Oh, this is actually a great addition”, then although it's probably a little bit harder to schedule witnesses who come in later, at the same time there's still the possibility of submission later on.
I'm okay to proceed on that basis. We have some witnesses. None will be that different from what other members have come up with, I think, but we have some names. We may have other names that we identify next week.
Liberal
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Peter Fonseca
It would be pretty hard for you to reach out to somebody on a Thursday or Friday before a Monday or Tuesday meeting.