Justice Committee on Dec. 6th, 2012

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

No.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan—Coquihalla, BC]

No, it's non-debatable. Okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

He challenged the chair.

Shall the chair's ruling be sustained?

(Ruling of the chair sustained: yeas 9; nays 2)

The chair's ruling stands. Now we have a motion.

[An hon. member]

The motion is debatable.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

Yes.

Go ahead, Mr. Garrison.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Since there is a lot of interest in the bill, it's obvious that the time available today would not allow us to finish the amendments, and therefore that's the reason that those who have expressed so much interest, I'm sure, will be supporting the extension.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Madame Boivin.

[Françoise Boivin, NDP, Gatineau, QC]

We also did it for Bill C-394 and Bill C-273, last week. We voted in favour of Bill C-273, sponsored by our Liberal colleague, Hedy Fry, so we could study those provisions thoroughly.

We are at clause 2 and we barely have an hour left. No doubt our new committee member, who has the right to speak but not to vote, has a number of questions because he did not have the benefit of hearing the various witnesses. Given that there is such interest in the topic, as we can see, and if the questions are, as they would say in English, perfectly

genuine and come from the heart,

we see no logical reason not to allow the extension, given the small window we have. December 10 is fast approaching. This isn't an unreasonable request, as we see it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

Okay. Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr. Rathgeber.

[Brent Rathgeber, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

I'm confused as to why the motion is brought at 4:25 as opposed to 5:25.

Yes, there is a lot of interest in this bill. These are important matters, and we want to get this right, so we have taken some time and considered alternative definitions of what is and isn't “gender identity”. I don't know why this committee would presuppose its progress in the next hour. Maybe we will get through it.

In any event, I would suggest that the motion is premature at this point and I would encourage honourable members to vote against it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

Thank you.

Mr. Seeback is next.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Brampton West, ON]

Lots of issues have been raised. I have raised some issues that I think are important.

Through no fault of the committee, we've had a number of votes, by my count, that have interrupted two committee hearings that certainly would have allowed us to flesh out a number of these issues. Officials today have been very helpful with some of the information they've given us, but those are the unfortunate circumstances in which the committee finds itself.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

Go ahead, Mr. Anderson.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Mr. Chair, because a bill is confusing doesn't mean it needs to be extended.

I do have a deep interest in this bill. I don't think it is all that complicated, but I think it's very misdirected. There has been a fair amount of time already given to the bill.

I don't have a vote on this so, of course, the other members here will decide that, but clearly Canadians have been heard. I'm not sure it needs to go much further here, because they've told us they're concerned about the bill, concerned about the issues of the gender identity and gender expression that are in the bill.

The NDP seems to be unwilling to.... I tried to address one issue. I'm not sure if Mr. Garrison is withdrawing his cooperation or not, but the reality is that neither of those terms, whether they're in or out of the bill, has been defined, and they haven't been defined in a way that would give any reason for those of us who are parliamentarians to support the bill or to continue to support the bill.

I'm concerned that it's come to committee here and doesn't seem to have changed direction at all. It doesn't seem to have clarified the definitions to a point at which Canadians are going to be comfortable with them, so I'm not sure what's going to be gained by taking more time on this.

It's true that this is a bill that's troubling. It's troubling for a whole number of reasons. It's extending another level of protection to a category of individuals who haven't been covered in the past, and it certainly has far-reaching implications for them and for Canadian society. I think it's because the definitions are so poorly written and explained that we need to get the bill back to the House and try to have it defeated as quickly as possible.

These terms, “gender identity” and “gender expression”, are words we've been told today are not words that are in common usage. They're not being used regularly. It seems to me that if this bill is passed into law—and I think actually this is simply a delay tactic by the opposition to try to drag this out a little bit longer—the definitions of these words, as I pointed out earlier, are going to be left to the human rights tribunals and the courts to decide. I simply think that's inappropriate. The committee is too far along now to be able to do anything about that.

They have the amendments. I don't think any of them are adequate in terms of explaining those terms, so typically it should go back to the House. It's time to go back to the House, and I certainly would support that.

The other problem with the definitions is that they're inconclusive. When we talk about the subjectivity of them, they're basically going to make sure that gender norms are confusing for the general public. No one is going to be able to really understand what they are, and so—

[Françoise Boivin, NDP, Gatineau, QC]

Point of order, Mr. Chair.

Since we are dealing with the motion, I think we should focus on that. I am listening to Mr. Anderson, and I appreciate his comments and taking note of them, for that matter, but they seem to be more relevant to the amendments. We are dealing with the motion on the extension, because we don't want all the committee's work to go to waste, work that he did not contribute to, and because we don't want the bill going back to Parliament in its original form, meaning without the benefit of witness input and discussion between the parties. I have seen all the efforts made to find some common ground. No one should be pointing fingers at anyone else, especially when that person shows up at the committee out of the blue.

Point of order, Mr. Chair, because I believe we should be discussing the content of the motion, not the amendments, at this stage.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

Thank you, but I do believe the member is talking to the bill and the reasons we shouldn't extend it. It is directly addressed to this bill and nothing else.

Go ahead, Mr. Anderson.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

I think I should talk to the extension, and then if you want me to talk directly to the motion, I can certainly do that and I will.

I would like to go back to the House of Commons procedure and maybe remind people that we are obliged as committees, within 60 sitting days or from the date of reference, to report back with a private member's bill to the House, with or without amendment. Therefore, the bill's proponents need to do a couple of things: either recommend that the bill not be proceeded with further or request a one-time extension of 30 days to consider the bill or to refer it back to the House.

In the case that they are going to ask for an extension, reasons need to be given. Clearly, no reasons have been given today for an extension, and I'm arguing that there are no reasons for it to be extended. I certainly didn't hear any from the mover of the motion. His reason may be that his amendments might not be passed by 5:30, but he doesn't know that.

As Mr. Rathgeber pointed out, we had another hour here, and now we are spending it discussing this motion rather than discussing the amendment, so if there is any interference that's been run on getting this back to the House, it's been done by the NDP. If they are going to pursue this, they need to have some reasons to give you if this is going to go back to the House, and we certainly haven't got those.

We are told that after considering a private member's bill, the committee may report it to the House but report that it does not believe that the bill should proceed any further. Once a report is presented, a notion of motion can occur and the report is automatically placed on the notice paper. The motion stands in the name of the member who has presented the report, usually the chair of the committee. Well, Mr. Chair, that doesn't apply to this one.

In terms of an extension of consideration, we're told that if the committee feels it will not be able to complete its consideration of a private member's bill referred to it within 60 days, it may request an extension of 30 further sitting days, and only one of those can be sought.

Again, Mr. Chair, there need to be some reasons for that to go ahead, and I certainly haven't heard any.

I guess I am willing to give up the floor to hear those reasons. Then I would probably like to address them as well.

However, I don't see any valid reasons; it looks like the committee has done good work on this, and it's time to report back.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

Give me a minute to consult with the clerk.

Mr. Anderson's comments are accurate. We must have a reason to request it. I think your motion at this point is requesting the additional time, but without a reason.

[A voice]

It's fixable.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Chair, then I will simply say we've had two sessions of the committee interrupted by voting that has reduced the time available to deal with the bill—and I thank Mr. Seeback for raising that—so I move to amend the motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

I have a point of order first.

Go ahead, Mr. Seeback.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Brampton West, ON]

It would seem to me that if the motion was not properly put forward in that there is no reason, then the motion would have to be put again. I don't think partway through debate he can amend his motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

The ruling is that he can propose an amendment. It was properly put, so he can propose an amendment.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Chair, I propose that we add the reason that because two sessions of the committee were interrupted by votes of the House of Commons, we lacked sufficient time to finish our deliberations on the bill.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

The clerk can write it down.