Evidence of meeting #5 for International Trade in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was ceta.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Bashar Abu Taleb Committee Researcher
Yes, we can summarize the testimony up to November 23 in an interim report.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Judy Sgro
Then we would be able to include those two meetings on November 23. That gives you a fairly substantial amount of information to put forward.
Mrs. Gray, are you okay? Did you follow that?
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
Could we have clarification if there will be recommendations as well?
Part of this as well is that when we, as a committee, discussed this study we knew what the timelines were going to be and we all agreed to the timelines. At that point we hadn't heard from anyone that those timelines wouldn't be met, so I am just wondering....
I think the other thing we need to consider is that this committee has had one meeting since March, so this committee hasn't been overloaded. I would like to implore that we fulfill what was laid out in the motion and fulfill what the study is, based on the timelines that were in the motion.
Liberal
The Clerk
If I may just add, we were supposed to have a meeting on November 13, which was cancelled because we didn't have a time slot. That's why the November 13 meeting is back to November 23, so that's part of the problem.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Judy Sgro
Yes, there's that as well as the fact that we haven't had a meeting since March. I would just remind everyone that we're dealing with a pandemic, and that there weren't any meetings happening anywhere.
If we move forward on—
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
Madam Chair, on a point of order, if I may just say so, I sat on a committee that sat all summer, so there were other committees that sat all summer, but—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Judy Sgro
There were only the ones that had the opportunity because they were registered as critical committees and had to go.
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
Yes. Well, it's unfortunate that having one meeting pushed off will now delay us by over a month.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Judy Sgro
It all depends on what the committee wants. I'm suggesting, as the analysts have recommended, that we do a short interim report before Christmas because of the time sensitivity, and then we do a fuller report towards the end when we come back. We may have the opportunity to add some information to that report to make it a fuller report at that particular time.
Mr. Hoback.
Conservative
Randy Hoback Conservative Prince Albert, SK
Thank you, Chair.
Chair, this is just a question on process. If we do see legislation come forward, how are we going to deal with this? When I look at our schedules and timelines....
Ms. Bendayan, maybe you can give us some insight, because if something is coming forward that has to be ratified through the Senate before we break for Christmas, I'm looking at our timeline and at our report, and I'm sitting here saying that this doesn't make a lot of sense. We're going to finish a report after the December 31 deadline.
I understand that you have to do an interim report. I get that, and I'm okay with doing that, but what I'm concerned about as I look forward is how the heck we are going to get some priority to have Zoom meetings to do actual legislation. That needs to be brought up with the gods above to say okay, we have legislation coming when? And how is it going to get through the House? What's it going to look like? That needs to happen probably this week or next week, because after that it is not going to be physically possible to get through our House, unless we're going to hold the House up until December 19 and hold the Senate here through Christmas. If that's the game plan of the Liberal government, hey, we're on board and we can do that, but they need to give us a signal as to how serious they are about getting this done before December 31.
Right now, I don't see how it's physically possible to get it done. I don't see it, unless you totally neglect Parliament—which they've done in the past—and do it that way.
Liberal
Chandra Arya Liberal Nepean, ON
Madam Chair, I have to be somewhere else at 1 p.m. so unfortunately I can't continue.
Liberal
Rachel Bendayan Liberal Outremont, QC
I think what you'll see, Mr. Hoback, is that the government is willing to adjust in order to do what's necessary. I think everybody on this committee is certainly committed to ensuring the stability of international trade for us. We just heard from some important witnesses about how important that is for our companies. If a deal is reached, I think we can find a way to make this happen. Certainly, the study that we're undertaking now would have to be adjusted. I believe doing that would be possible, if necessary. I certainly hope we will be able to do that quickly and make it all happen.
I don't see any particular problem with going forward as the chair suggests, but if you and Ms. Gray would prefer not to have an interim report, that can certainly be discussed as well.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
Thanks, Madam Chair.
The only thing I would say with regard to an interim report—and this is just my own opinion and maybe it's mine alone—is that the information we got today from the four organizations, although they are very reputable, really didn't provide any insight at all as to where we are in a trade deal or what we're looking to gain or to lose. What we heard today was kind of Wikipedia 101 on things, so we'd probably need to hear some more details from other witnesses, in terms of pros and cons, good and bad, in order to do an interim report that would be more than something we could pick off Wikipedia.
Liberal
Rachel Bendayan Liberal Outremont, QC
Madam Chair, can I just respond to that?
Friday we have the negotiators coming to this committee in order to update us on the negotiations. I don't see why we were asking witnesses who are not part of the negotiations about the state of the negotiations. I think we will have our interim report reflect the testimony that we'll hear from our negotiators on Friday, and in the two meetings we have on Monday.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
Ms. Bendayan, I agree. That's fantastic.
I would just interject and say that the organizations here today basically said that if I have a question, I can email somebody and they'll write back with a response. It didn't sound as if many of them have been included in the negotiations to see where things would go forward. On Friday, maybe the negotiators will tell us otherwise.
NDP
Daniel Blaikie NDP Elmwood—Transcona, MB
I just want to ask, in the case that we are filing a small interim report with a summary of some testimony, will there be the possibility to have a supplementary report or a dissenting report attached to that?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Judy Sgro
Yes, of course. Absolutely.
At least getting a bit of the interim report in there will indicate some of the concerns and direction of the committee.
Seeing what the time is and that we're over it, to update you, COVID-19 and trade will continue in November. On December 7, we'll start to talk about the WTO. That's the plan, but we always have to have some flexibility as we move forward.
We will see you all on Friday at our next committee meeting.
Thank you all very much for your participation. Thank you, Madam Clerk, our analysts and everyone else.
Have a good day.
The meeting is adjourned.