National Defence Committee on Jan. 31st, 2008

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

We'll call the meeting to order.

Before we get started, I would like to ask a favour of the committee. If we could in any way wrap up this meeting just a little early, the chair and some others here would really appreciate it. But that's your call. We are here until 5:30, if need be.

Mr. Coderre.

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Chairman, with the committee's permission, I would like us to settle the issue of the motion immediately.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Is there a consensus for that?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Okay, we will do that.

The motion has been presented and circulated, with notice given, and we will deal with it now. I'll ask Mr. Hawn to introduce it and then give each party an opportunity to comment or give their thoughts about that.

Go ahead, Mr. Hawn.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

People have the motion before them. I'm going to make one small suggestion for a change, but mainly the motion is so that people have an opportunity to question the Manley panel, to challenge them or whatever, to question ministers of the crown--Defence, Foreign Affairs, CIDA--and potentially to call and question other witnesses over a fairly compressed period.

What we're suggesting is what would amount to six meetings, I believe, to February 28. Obviously it's an item of intense public interest, of intense parliamentary interest. We think it's in Canadians' interests, and, frankly, parliamentarians' interests, to have the opportunity to do that in public. There are many different sides to this debate, and we feel they all need to be aired. We feel that airing them with the Manley panel--who came up with, we thought, a fairly concise report--and the ministers involved would be in the interests of public information, obviously in the interests of democracy, and in the interests of collectively helping us to make a decision on the Afghanistan mission question when it ultimately comes up in the House.

There's going to be debate in the House, of course, and probably fairly lively debate. We think, as members of this committee and the foreign affairs committee, that if anybody ought to be as up to speed on it as possible, it would be the members of these two committees.

The same process is going on at the foreign affairs committee right now, and since we don't know what they're going to do and they don't know what we're going to do ultimately, I would put out the option of adding in the first line, after “Pursuant to standing order 108(1)(a), that the committee meet jointly”, the words “or individually”. If they decide not to and we decide to, then we have the option of doing it individually.

I would suggest that an option of each committee doing it individually would get a little onerous in terms of the time we would be requesting of the people of the Manley panel, the ministers, and potentially other witnesses. So if they do decide to do it, then we would do it jointly, but if they decide not to do it and we do, we could have the option of doing it individually.

Then we can talk about or take some other suggestions as they come up for things--you know, the way we may want to actually make this work--but basically the motion would be that we meet jointly or individually, and the rest of the motion would stay the same.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

I understand that the mover can't amend the motion before it's presented. But if necessary, we'll deal with that. I appreciate the--

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Well, I'll just put that out for somebody who may want to make an amendment that should be taken as friendly.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

The motion has been moved by Mr. Hawn.

Comments, Mr. Coderre?

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Chairman, we will not be moving any amendments. We plan to vote against the motion as a whole. I had requested that theMinister of National Defence appear to speak to the issue of supply, but unfortunately, he was unavailable, or did not make himself available. Now, it would seem that he is available to testify.

Moreover, we have already conducted a study on Afghanistan. We are pretty familiar with this file. Many, if not all, members of the committee have travelled to Afghanistan. The Manley report commissioned by the Prime Minister has been tabled. I believe most, if not all, of us have read it.

I fail to see how what is being proposed here is relevant, particularly since we held a joint meeting before the holidays which was attended by theMinister of Foreign Affairs and the Minister of National Defence. Consequently, I think we can settle this matter quickly, Mr. Chairman.

I plan to vote against this amendment as a whole.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Mr. Cannis, did you have a comment as well, before I move on?

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

I did, Mr. Chairman. I'll try to be brief.

I have really thought about this over and over again, in the spirit of excellent cooperation in this committee that I've served on for so long. It's like reinventing the wheel, if I may just pick up from the comments, and I say this with the greatest of respect to the Manley team.

My good friend the parliamentary secretary, Laurie Hawn, talked about parliamentarians' interests, if I may quote: “question other witnesses”, “helping us make a decision”, “concise report”, “for public information”, “take other suggestions”. Out of all that I quoted, the one thing I can really allow some validity to is “take other suggestions”. All the other comments that I've tried to quote, my good friend, are in areas, Mr. Chairman—through you to the committee—that we belaboured for such an extensive period of time and through dozens and dozens of witnesses.

I would find it useless to call in other witnesses, because I think, with all due respect, we exhausted the witnesses we were looking to bring before the committee as we were putting our report on Afghanistan together—from academics, from former military people, experts in the military field, etc.

I also—and I'm very polite with this word—find it in some ways insulting to the committee, both current members and previous members, who had invested so much time and effort and zeal to put that report together.

I now have—thank you to our clerk—the response from the government. I'm going through it right now, so I'm not in a position to even comment and compare yet. I hope over the next little while to do so. I'm going through the Manley report, and my question on the Manley report, to which I already have the answers, is that I don't even think they met with one-tenth of the people we met, the experts. We unfortunately didn't have the opportunity to be on site, as they were, to see firsthand—at least I did not.... I know some members had the opportunity to visit, and you did the good work that you did.

The other concern, and I close with this, Mr. Chairman, is this. We know the time constraints when it comes to committee work. Each party has an allotment of a specific time, five minutes and so on. I would find it useless if we did not have a completely open session of unlimited time, if I may use that word, to get into the guts of asking this panel or others to indulge in exchange with us. Speaking for myself, if I'm going to have five minutes in a second round for my questions and the answers I hope to get, I don't think I'm going to get very far.

So with that, I have great reservations, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Next on the list is Mr. Bouchard, and then Ms. Black.

[Robert Bouchard, Bloc, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

As someone already said, it would be rather pointless to have Mr. Manley and his team appear before the committee. I do not think we would get any more information in the process. I am familiar with the main points of the report, since these have been widely addressed by the media. Furthermore, we have all made our positions known. I have been interviewed on the radio and I have commented on the report.

I also intend to vote against the motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thanks, Mr. Bouchard.

Ms. Black.

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

I think I concur with the other people on the opposition side of the table that it won't really foster a positive kind of debate in the public arena. The one time we had the joint committee meeting it was really a horrible experience. There wasn't an opportunity for any kind of real debate, and there were a number of witnesses appearing at the time. The only way I could describe it, and I think I did this privately with Laurie, is that it was like participating in a gong show, and I'm really not prepared to put myself or anyone else on the committee through that again.

The other thing I would say to the government is that I agree that the Manley report deserves to be debated. I believe it should be debated in the House, so I would urge the government to put forward a government motion—through the House under government orders—that would allow not only people on the defence or foreign affairs committee to participate in the debate, but would allow all members of Parliament who wished to participate to debate the recommendations of the Manley report. I think that would be far more democratic. It would allow all members of Parliament an opportunity to put their views forward.

That's my position. I won't be voting in favour of this motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you.

We have a bunch of people on the other side of the table who now want to speak—Mr. Lunney, Mr. Hawn, and Ms. Gallant—and then we'll go back to Mr. Bachand, and then over to Mr. Blaney.

Mr. Lunney.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I guess at some point I should stop prefacing my remarks by talking about being a new member on the committee, but I haven't had the privilege of going to Afghanistan as some of you have.

I'm kind of surprised, actually, at the response from members on the other side. As I had a quick review of the Manley report, I was quite impressed with the extensive list of people they met with on the ground over there, not only armed forces officials but Afghan officials, aid groups, and international groups from around the country and around the world participating in the rebuilding over there.

I think we all respect the members of the panel, from three different governments, three different former cabinet ministers and two different senior diplomats. But I think there must be an awful lot about what's going on on the ground over there that would be of value to the committee members to hear. I certainly would recognize that having a joint committee meeting is a bit of a challenge in terms of participation for members, and probably the ones who aren't in senior positions are likely to have a little less time than others in participating. I think on this side there's certainly room to discuss that formula, how that might work.

I would just like to express and appeal to our colleagues to consider that this is an issue that is certainly important for all of us. We're looking forward to the debate. There will be a debate in the House. And more information from people who have been on the ground over there would certainly help to inform that debate and would be of use to all of us, I would think.

I just submit those comments for consideration.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you, Mr. Lunney.

Mr. Hawn, did you want to make a comment? We are going by the speaking order. You're next, and then Ms. Gallant and Mr. Bachand.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have a couple of points I want to stress. We are willing to be flexible.

First of all, I accept what Mr. Cannis says about the fact that we all spend a lot of time listening to a lot of witnesses and so on. He also said we didn't have the opportunity for the on-site exposure that the Manley panel had. I suggested that would be a valuable addition to what we already know.

With respect to Ms. Black's comment, these things aren't a debate. The hearings with the Manley panel, whatever, are not supposed to be a debate. They're supposed to be for questioning and informing, not so much a matter of debate, which is what they would be. I would suggest that the kinds of folks who are going to lead the debate.... Whatever we do as a committee and whatever the foreign affairs committee does is not going to change the extent or the depth or the thoroughness of the debate in the House. What it would do is make members of this committee and their committee potentially better informed to lead the debate or participate in the debate from our own parties' perspectives as representatives who are perhaps better informed about everything than the average party member. I would throw that out as a benefit as well.

As Mr. Bouchard said, there are things.... We've all read the Manley panel. There are obviously things about it that we each would like to emphasize or de-emphasize, or agree with or disagree with. To me, that's an opportunity to get those points out in public, to re-emphasize whatever anybody's party or personal position is. It's a good opportunity to do that with the people who obviously have spent a lot of time looking at these things.

With respect to the questioning, Mr. Lunney brought up that the standard questioning order could become problematic, and I understand that from the points of view of the NDP and the Bloc. We would be willing to alter that, or to accept the suggestion that we alter it, to just go straight on party rotation. So it would go Liberal, Bloc, NDP, Conservative, Liberal, Bloc, NDP, Conservative. That would essentially give the NDP twice as many questions. It would essentially give the Bloc 50% more questions. It would give you more opportunity than you would normally get within a process like the one we have been following to get your points across, to press for the points that you want made public, and so on. I would think that would be to your liking.

We don't suggest doing this for everything, but this is a special case. I mean, this is the most high-profile thing in Parliament at the moment. It's probably the most high-profile thing in Canadian public opinion at the moment. This is, in our view, a great opportunity to highlight that to the public, to highlight parliamentarians, to ask tough questions, to do whatever you want to do. Again, it's not really a debate, but it's asking tough questions and hopefully getting answers, and at least highlighting the things you have concerns over.

With respect to the length, we suggested until February 28. I think if we want to shorten that up to make it more concise then I would totally agree with not recalling witnesses we've already heard from, because we know where they stand and so on, and limiting it to a couple of sessions with the Manley panel and a couple of sessions with the ministers. That would compress the timeframe and would I think cater to Mr. Cannis' concerns about having already heard a bunch of that. That's a valid point.

So I throw those out as suggestions that I think would meet a lot of the concerns that have been expressed here. I would just like to emphasize that this is an opportunity that we're trying to present in the interest of public information and in the interest of parliamentarians asking questions of the people who have framed the debate in a lot of ways. It would be a shame to see this committee turn down the opportunity to do that for the better information of ourselves as committee members and for the better information of the Canadian public. I think that would be, frankly, a disservice to the Canadian public and a disservice to Parliament.

So I throw out those things in the interest of trying to come to a positive conclusion on this, that we adopt a different questioning sequence, that we disregard hearing other witnesses, that we stick to the Manley panel and the panel of ministers, and that we do it jointly or individually--again, depending on what the other committee says.

To do it individually with each of those could potentially be explored as an option too, but I hope everybody understands that we're asking a lot of the Manley panel and the ministers to come back to each committee. That's asking an awful lot of those folks.

So I throw those out as friendly suggestions, and I hope they will be taken as such because it would be a terrible shame for us to miss the opportunity, and for the Canadian public to miss the opportunity, to sit in on that kind of an information session.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you.

Ms. Gallant, and then Mr. Bachand.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

In the sense that the information is pretty familiar to us, yes, there is a lot of the same information we're seeing in the Manley report that we heard during testimony during our Afghanistan study. What is different are the conclusions they drew and their set of recommendations. I'd like to hear the panellists and ask them some questions, because we haven't had the opportunity to speak to them and determine how they drew their conclusions.

As Mr. Hawn mentioned, Canadians in general have not heard the witnesses, so we have an advantage over everyday Canadians by hearing firsthand what's happening on the ground in Afghanistan. I don't know if there's a reason why the opposition doesn't want the Canadian public to hear firsthand in the same way we did.

Insofar as the work plan being interrupted, the work plan has been abrogated by the opposition. Every time something topical comes up, or they just have a whim, we have bent. So now there is an issue of importance to all Canadians, not just this committee. I know we're outnumbered, but I think this is a worthwhile detour, and we can certainly get back to our qualify-of-life study as soon as possible and even put in extra time for the quality-of-life study, to catch up if necessary.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you for that, Ms. Gallant.

I have Mr. Bachand, Mr. Blaney, and Mr. Cannis. Then we'll have everybody have a crack at it here.

Mr. Bachand.

[Claude Bachand, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

There are two ways of looking at the current situation: through the eyes of the Conservative Members or from the Opposition's perspective.

If I were a Conservative MP, I would certainly like to put Mr. Manley front and centre, especially since he is a Liberal and it would be like twisting the knife in his party's wound, so to speak. That's what I would like, if I were a Conservative. I would certainly endorse this idea. Furthermore, I would emphasize the fact that Mr. Manley is a very credible individual. I would be very much in favour of the idea, since Mr. Manley was appointed by my Prime Minister. How could I object? I would want to give him some credibility and to have him stay on the job as long as possible.

However, since I am not a Conservative MP, you need to understand that I will argue as hard as I can against this happening. I remind you that the Bloc was opposed to striking this panel of experts. We have also maintained that this was a job for parliamentarians. Consequently, you can understand that we are not in favour of giving this panel a second kick at the can.

If I were a Conservative MP, I think it would be in my best interest to block all committee meetings until the end of February. You all know what we have on our agenda. We plan to address a series of health-related issues that will prove quite controversial for the government. We will not just be dealing with the number of fatalities in Afghanistan, but also with the number of casualties and how the injured are being treated. Clearly then, if I were a Conservative MP, I would want to set the agenda aside until the end of February.

However, since I am not a Conservative MP, but rather an opposition member, I have to present arguments to the contrary.

As a Conservative MP, I would want to have all my ministers highly visible for one month. I would applaud the fact that four ministers put in an appearance, even though we virtually had no time to put any questions to them.

However, I am not a Conservative MP and I do not want to put Conservative ministers in the spotlight for one month.

If I were a Conservative MP, I would also be happy to hear my prime minister announce that he was going to Bucharest, without knowing exactly when a debate was scheduled. I would want to give my prime minister as much leeway as possible, by announcing that the debate would certainly not take place in the House, since the matter is on the agenda of the national defence and foreign affairs and international development committees and we need to await the outcome of their discussions. The Conservatives would save a lot of time by doing this, but I am not a Conservative MP.

A motion representing the government's position should be tabled in the House of Commons. It is the government's responsibility to act in this manner. That way, the Prime Minister would arrive in Bucharest with a mandate in hand. However, we have the feeling that the government is playing for time in an effort to win over the public.

Since I am not a Conservative MP, I cannot support this initiative. I hope my colleagues will not hold it against me. I do not harbour any ill will toward them because if I were in their shoes, I would be doing exactly as they are. However, they should not think ill of us either for not pursuing the same objectives.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you, Mr. Bachand.

Mr. Blaney, Mr. Cannis, Mr. Hawn, and then Mr. Lunney. I'm not going to let this go on too long, if that's okay.

Mr. Blaney.