Evidence of meeting #3 for Justice and Human Rights in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was vote.
A video is available from Parliament.
1 p.m.
Liberal
Arif Virani Liberal Parkdale—High Park, ON
I'll propose—and perhaps we can achieve unanimous consent—that we move to have 12 Liberal witnesses, 12 Conservative witnesses, four Bloc witnesses and four NDP witnesses, with unlimited written submissions from any of those people who are not able to attend. Then we provide those lists to you and the clerk, Madam Chair, so that we can get going with the scheduling.
1 p.m.
Liberal
Mike Kelloway Liberal Cape Breton—Canso, NS
Thanks, Madam Chair.
Actually, Arif beat me to the punch on that. I look at 12, 12, four and four as reasonable.
Of course, the big caveat for me is that we use the terminology “unlimited written submissions” as well. I think that's a reasonable consensus, given the gravity of the item at hand.
1 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Iqra Khalid
Thank you very much.
I believe that we have a consensus as this time for 12, 12, four and four per party. For clarity, it's 12 for the Conservatives, 12 for the Liberals, four for the Bloc and four for the NDP. Can I please ask you to submit your top 12 or four, depending on your party, to the clerk and me at your earliest convenience, maybe by the end of day tomorrow, so that we can get the invitations out over the next couple of weeks to the witnesses?
I believe M.O.G., our clerk, has a quick question for clarity for November 3.
Mr. Clerk.
1 p.m.
The Clerk
Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair.
I just wanted information about the November 3 meeting with Minister Lametti, Minister Hajdu, and Minister Qualtrough, this coming Tuesday. Is it the full two hours or would it be like a super-panel of one hour only and then in the second hour you would have other witnesses from the civil society?
Thank you.
1 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Iqra Khalid
Thank you, Mr. Clerk.
Given that it's three ministers within that time frame, I leave it to the committee to decide if it would like to have a second panel or two panels.
Mr. Lewis, I see that you would like all three ministers to appear for the two panels?
1 p.m.
Liberal
Arif Virani Liberal Parkdale—High Park, ON
Yes.
The committee will determine this, but I'll posit that we've just heard from Minister Lametti and we haven't heard from Minister Hajdu or Minister Qualtrough. They'll be speaking on a bill, as opposed to the general estimates. I'm just conscious of the fact that we have a number of witnesses to get through. If two meetings, as opposed to one, are used for the ministers, it will effectively have a knock-on impact on the rest of the scheduling, which may impede the ability of the witnesses to give us their full view.
That's for something for us to deliberate upon. Obviously it is in the hands of the committee as to what people want to do.
1:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Iqra Khalid
My understanding from the general gist of the committee is that you all want the three ministers to appear for the two hours. I think that where the majority of you are okay with that, that's what we'll do, unless there's any strong opposition to that.
1:05 p.m.
Liberal
James Maloney Liberal Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON
I'm in the same school of thought as Mr. Virani.
Mr. Lewis just made the point that we need to get as many brains around this table as possible, so we can be educated. I think I know where the ministers stand. I don't know what I'm going to hear from all of our witnesses. I think one hour with the three ministers for the reasons Mr. Virani just pointed out makes sense to me. Let's move forward with this thing. We don't want to lose a meeting.
Anyway, I'm not sure we have consensus around this table on that. Maybe we should take it to a vote.
1:05 p.m.
Conservative
Kerry-Lynne Findlay Conservative South Surrey—White Rock, BC
Madam Chair, with respect, I'm pleased that my colleague Mr. Maloney knows where the three ministers stand, but I don't necessarily know. That's the whole point of their coming. It's not very often that we get the opportunity. There's the intersection of their responsibilities with an important bill, and I think it's very helpful to Canadians to understand where they are coming from. It will give us a chance to talk it out.
I'm confident that this wonderful group of colleagues I'm sitting with will be able to handle the timing and the questions with respect to witnesses. We've just agreed on numbers. I think we'll handle this well. It's an opportunity for all Canadians to hear from three ministers of the Crown on what they're hoping to achieve and how they hope to achieve it, so I would say the time is very well spent.
1:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Iqra Khalid
Thank you, Ms. Findlay.
I will pose the question to the committee again. Do you want three ministers for two hours?
Mr. Virani.
1:05 p.m.
Liberal
Arif Virani Liberal Parkdale—High Park, ON
I'll reiterate that the steering committee made a determination to have four sessions in total of two hours each for hearing witnesses, and then two days allocated for clause-by-clause consideration.
If everyone is fully cognizant of working within those parameters and still wants to have the ministers appear for two hours as opposed to one, then we're obviously in the committee's hands as to what to do. But I just want everyone to fully understand what we're dealing with, because in the pre-COVID era, picking up an extra meeting or staying late was a lot easier to do. It's not easy to do in this environment. That's something to be aware of.
1:05 p.m.
Conservative
Rob Moore Conservative Fundy Royal, NB
There is a problem with limiting ourselves, on such an important bill, to only four meetings for witnesses. We see the amount of interest. We have 99 people interested right off the hop, and we saw how fast two hours go with one minister. How fast would one hour go with three ministers?
To Mr. Virani's point, that leaves us three more meetings of two sessions each. That's six sessions times four witnesses. That's 24 spots, of which the Conservatives have 12. That leaves only 12 left to split among the other three parties, so the numbers do not add up. If we're going to have 12, 12, 4 and 4, it would require moving to five witnesses per panel, and that's not fair to those witnesses, probably. It wouldn't leave much time after opening remarks for questions and answers. Somehow the math is not quite adding up.
1:05 p.m.
Liberal
Mike Kelloway Liberal Cape Breton—Canso, NS
I'm usually in a weak zone when we start talking about math. I thought this was the justice committee, but—
