National Defence Committee on Feb. 7th, 2019

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

It's in camera, but you want time.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Yes, but—

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Can we at least—

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

I would agree with that, Mr. Gerretsen, that we suspend and then not go in camera but we discuss this motion and go forward from there.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Yes, we just pick up where we left off.

Okay, fair enough.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Mr. Selkirk, thank you for your time once again, and thank you for your service to Canada.

I'm going to suspend so that we can bring in our other panellists.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Before we resume debate on the motion, I want to acknowledge our new panellists.

We have the Honourable Marie Deschamps, former justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, via video conference from Montreal.

Thank you very much for being here.

We also have Laura Nash, who is in the room with us.

Thank you both. Please bear with us for a second while we deal with a motion that Ms. Gallant has put on the table.

Mr. Gerretsen has the floor.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Just for clarification, the copy of the motion that we have before us is the older version, which does not have the amendment. Are we discussing the amendment right now, or are we discussing...?

What are we discussing?

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

We're discussing the amendment, actually.

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

We're putting in two words. Instead of just having “the Auditor General”, we're putting in “Office of the Auditor General” because, of course—

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Then we should probably change the concerning “his Fall”—

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Right.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

—and make it “the Fall...”.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

“Concerning the Fall”....

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

We're talking about the amendment now, so go ahead.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Are we just talking about the amendment to change those couple of words?

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Then we're going to want to move to the motion, I suspect.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

I have something to say, but I'll wait until after we've gone through this amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Okay.

Is there any other debate on the amendment to the motion?

(Amendment agreed to)

We are on the motion itself.

Mr. Gerretsen.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Like Ms. Gallant, I express my condolences to the family of Mr. Ferguson. It's obviously an extremely difficult time not just for his family but also for what's going on in his office.

What I would recommend that we do, and I think then I can be supportive of this motion, is remove the words “before March 31st, 2019”, because if we do that, then at least we can give the office some time to sort out who the new auditor general is going to be. That person would then have to be brought up to speed on the particular files, and then it would go from there.

I'm happy to support this motion, but first I would move an amendment that we delete the words “before March 31st, 2019”.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Is there debate on Mr. Gerretsen's amendment?

Mr. Bezan.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

I don't believe that this is necessary. As noted previously, Mr. Ferguson has been ill for some time. His office has been presenting the reports this fall to public accounts and to other committees, on the various reports they tabled in the House. They are more than prepared to speak to these two reports, because the authors of the two reports are available to come to committee, as they have already appeared at other committees.

These two reports, though, are germane to this committee, especially the one on report 5 on inappropriate sexual behaviour and how it impacts diversity, which we're studying right now.

I think that the sooner we can have the Office of the Auditor General appear, the better it is, not just to hear and talk to them directly, but for the study we're doing right now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

I have Cheryl, and then we'll go back to you, Mr. Gerretsen.

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

As was discussed before, the Office of the Auditor General is.... He is the authority on the impact that inappropriate sexual behaviour is having on our forces and on recruitment, retention, and well-being of women and of men. To ensure that diversity is a must for this committee, and if we want to include it in this report—if you're intending on having the report tabled before Parliament rises—it's incumbent on us to hear the testimony before we wind up the study.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Mr. Gerretsen.