National Defence Committee on June 21st, 2011

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

One staff member of what?

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

One staff member from a House officer. I think that means....

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Every House officer, or would you just say party whip?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Why don't we just make the party whip a member of the subcommittee?

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Because House officers are whips and House leaders.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Right, so let's say “whip”, then.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Do we have a written version of that? This subtlety makes it.... Do we have a written version?

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Ms. Gallant.

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

Point of order: do we have a written version in English and French?

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

I don't have it in French.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

This is the business at hand, and we can deal with motions without their being translated. Translations can be circulated later.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

So we could say that one staff member from a whip's office can attend any meeting.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Yes, that would be better.

Is everybody clear on that? That's the question we're going to vote on.

(Motion agreed to) [See Minutes of Proceedings]

The next one concerns reduced quorum. You guys have it in front of you.

Mr. Alexander.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

I would move that the language we have be adjusted to read as follows:

That the chair be authorized to hold meetings to receive evidence and to have that evidence printed when a quorum is not present, provided that at least four members are present, including one member from each recognized party.

I would recommend adding another paragraph that would simply cover the issues regarding quorum for meetings that take place outside the parliamentary precinct. We would add:

In the case of previously scheduled meetings taking place outside the parliamentary precinct, the committee members in attendance shall only be required to wait for 15 minutes following the designated start of the meeting before they may proceed to hear witnesses and receive evidence, regardless of whether opposition or government members are present.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Harris.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

I believe I have a point of order on this motion.

I think we agreed to discuss these motions. We don't have them written in front of us, we don't have them in English and French, and we haven't had time to give any consideration to them. I had no idea we were moving so far afield. I don't know what's coming next. This meeting is really to elect the chairs, and we can do other things only by agreement.

If we're talking about a minor adjustment of a word here or there, or a clarification, that's one thing, and I don't have a problem with it. But this seems to me to be going far afield. Are we meeting on Thursday of this week? If we are, and if there is anything to be changed, perhaps we can go through this list and do the ones that are staying the same. If there are adjustments being proposed, we will have written copies of the proposed amendments in both official languages, and we can consider them on Thursday.

I don't know what else is coming, but it seems to me there are plans afoot, not coincidentally, on the part of the parliamentary secretary to change the rules of this committee. I'd like to have some advance notice of what these proposals are before we have to consider them and vote on them.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. McKay.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

I agree with Mr. Harris. There are actually two proposals by the parliamentary secretary, and one is substantively different from what was presented here. In principle I don't know that I have much objection to it.

If there are other changes, which I suspect there will be towards the end, and if we have them all in front of us, this meeting might go much more quickly next Thursday. Assuming there was a circulation of the proposals by the majority party, we could have some workout prior to the next committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Speaking to the point of order, I have Ms. Gallant.

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

With respect to Jack's notion of coming back with pre-written amendments, is that required when we have a meeting like this? Can we not just work through it, motion by motion, according to what's necessary? Is there a requirement to provide changes in advance, if there are any more?

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Norlock.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

I've come from last week's public safety and national security committee, where we dealt with the election of chairs and the routine motions. We were able to deal with that. There were changes to several sections.

If we're embarking upon a new way of doing things at this committee.... Of course I know that every committee is different and is master of its own house, as it were, but if every time someone comes up with a motion we have to circulate it and deal with it at the next meeting, we're not going to get too much done at these meetings if we are not able to deal with things in an expeditious way, after having fully fleshed them out and discussed them, as is appropriate to do at meetings such as this.

I just hope that we're not going to be involved in esoteric discussions every time we have slight changes to the way it has always been done at this committee. Change is inevitable. Change will happen. It's how we adapt to that change and how quickly we do that...we'll have a moniker of success or otherwise.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Harris, for your second intervention, please keep it brief and make sure it relates to the point of order.

Then I have Mr. McKay and Monsieur Brahmi.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Obviously, change happens and all of that sort of stuff, but here the government is proposing changes to the rules of this committee. They're not talking about national defence or some substantive matter that we're dealing with. The government is proposing changes to the rules and we are asking that we see copies of those changes in both official languages. All the members on the committee are new except for Ms. Gallant and me, and I just don't think it's right that we be asked to deal with this without seeing those changes.

The purpose of this reduced quorum is to allow evidence to be heard so that people can't manipulate the committee by walking out of the room and various other things like that. Let's not just assume that these are minor changes that occur, that these are just inconsequential and we don't need to see copies or we don't need to think about them. This is being done by consensus. If you're going to insist on roaring through all this, then that consensus will not be offered by our side--or at least not by me--in terms of proceeding in this manner. We agreed to do this in a collegial way.

It's only the motions that people are prepared to have consensus on that can be dealt with. Other committees have met and have not dealt with every issue because there wasn't sufficient opportunity to consider it or have copies of it, so I don't think it's untoward to suggest.... We're meeting again on Thursday anyway, I presume, as it's part of the schedule. If people aren't prepared to do that, then I'm going to withdraw my consent to proceeding, but I think we can proceed with things like distribution of documents, working meals, witness expenses, etc. These are uncontroversial things here, unless there are suggested significant changes. Let's get the ones that we agree upon.

For the ones that might require further discussion or a proposal.... I can see something coming here on allocation of time for witnesses. I have no doubt that there's a new proposal on this, and so there should be, but let's see what the proposal is so that we can either agree on it or perhaps negotiate a change or suggest changes. For the ones that require that consideration, let's do them on Thursday.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. McKay...?

No, I'll tell you what: I'm ready to make a ruling on the point of order raised. I don't think I need to have any more interventions.

Just so everybody is aware, on the motions, I asked for concurrence. We were going to go ahead, as is common practice with committees when they're being reconstituted, to accept the routine motions. Those routine motions are before you. At any time, amendments can be moved on any motion that has been put before committee.

All of you have had these motions in front of you for the last few days now. They were circulated by the clerk after committee memberships were established, so you knew what the motions were. There have been some amendments made. Amendments are acceptable at any time when a motion is before the committee.

There have been amendments brought forward that are acceptable, so we're not in violation of any rules here, especially when right now we don't have any rules governing our set-up. That's what we're trying to do right now in adopting the routine motions.

So what I am going to suggest, Mr. Alexander, is that if you're moving amendments, try to move them based upon the circulation of the motions that we had before us. Amend those existing motions rather than bring forward a whole bunch of new wording, which seems to be somewhat cantankerous. I would suggest that you work on that basis.

If members want to have a quick recess to talk among yourselves about what potential amendments might be coming forward so you have a better handle on them.... But I do want to get this done today, so that if we do decide to have another meeting on Thursday, we can, or if we're going to be recessed and out of here by Thursday, hopefully, then we don't have to meet again until the fall.

That's my purpose right now. With that, I would suggest that we have a quick recess and get back at it in about five minutes.

We're suspended.