Public Accounts Committee on Feb. 3rd, 2009

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

In the spirit of moving on, and not wishing to put the chair in an awkward position, to start these proceedings I think it's really important that we try to deal effectively and not come to a situation where that would happen. For that particular reason, as a member who voted the previous way, I would abstain from this and leave that responsibility so it wouldn't have to be handled by the chair. And I think we could move on to the next issue, if that's possible.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I have received advice from the clerk, and she indicated to me that the proper procedure, given the circumstances, is to take the vote again. Following her advice, I'm going to do that.

(Amendment negatived)

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Now we're into another one, back to the original motion.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

I amended it. It is a friendly amendment.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

I liked the wording of my colleague, if you could raise that. Bonnie, I thought the way you worded it worked great.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

All right, my amendment is as follows: that the subcommittee on agenda and procedure be established and be composed of the chair, two vice-chairs, and a member of the two other opposition parties.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Perfect.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Mr. Chair, we have an amendment to the amendment. It's a friendly amendment, just a clarification.

We suggest that the subcommittee on agenda and procedure be established, to be composed of the chair and a representative from each of the parties.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

You might want “and a representative from all the parties”.

I'll read what I have here and I'll go back to you, Ms. Ratansi.

The amendment is that the subcommittee on agenda and procedure be established and be comprised of the chair and one representative from all the parties.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

That sounds fine.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

You're fine with that. The intent, of course, is that it be the chair and one Conservative, one Liberal, one NDP, and one Bloc.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Does that mean that the chair is going to have a vote or not have a vote in a situation?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

No, the chair would have no vote in a situation like that.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Can we neuter a chair? I don't know.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

We usually have unanimous recommendations or non-unanimous recommendations. It's usually in one of the two camps. I doubt we would go to the chair for a tiebreaker. It would fall into the category of not having unanimity. When that happens we don't spend too much time fighting the minutia. There's no point to it. That's what is to take place here. So there would be no recommendation, or there would be an acknowledgement that we tried to give us a starting point but we didn't have unanimity.

Very rarely...and I stand to be corrected, but I can't think of an instance when the steering committee sent something to this committee that was really important on a majority vote only. I think we just sent it as not being able to come to an agreement, with the factors we looked at, where we got stuck, and where we are. Otherwise, we just have that whole discussion and then have the whole discussion all over again here.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Mr. Shipley.

[Bev Shipley, Conservative, Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Looking at that particular item and at this committee as it is now, where we have a Liberal member as chair, a vice-chair from the government, a vice-chair from the NDP, and the opposition is the Bloc, if you leave that as it is written, it accomplishes without an amendment.... So I'm not sure why we're talking about an amendment. It's actually about when another committee changes, but in this particular one, the next year or when the next committee forms, they will come back and do it for that committee.

You have to be careful, Mr. Chair, that we actually have equal and balanced distribution on it. That may change if we were to change it to a member of the two other opposition parties. We very easily could have, for example, the Bloc with two people on that subcommittee. And that isn't, I don't think, what the spirit would be...whether it was any party.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Shipley, we have removed the “two” in this, recommending instead that the subcommittee on agenda and procedure be established and be composed of the chair and one representative from each party.

[Bev Shipley, Conservative, Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, ON]

I understand, but quite honestly, if you leave it the way it is, you've accomplished that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

If I may, Mr. Shipley, I believe--somebody please correct me if I'm wrong--the intent of the amendment is to increase the membership of the steering committee from four to five. We would have the chair plus a Liberal, a Conservative, a New Democrat, and a member of the Bloc. I believe that is the intent.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

And that wording would work regardless of which party was in the chair.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Can I also ask what the quorum is of the subcommittee?

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Bonnie came up with better language, so I just deferred to her motion. It was the same thing. The effect of this motion as just read is to increase the membership so that we would have an actual representative from the party that the chair comes from. Right now we don't.

So when John Williams was the chair, we had no Conservative there. Now, that was fine, because John pretty much ran everything. It wasn't a problem. But in fairness, when you're having meetings like that, you really want to hear all the political perspectives. It's difficult for the chair to do that and be a partisan.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Ms. Crombie, back to you. I have you on the list.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

My question had to do with quorum. I just want to ensure that since the chair is usually neutral, if there should be any discussion requiring a vote of any kind, everyone is represented at the subcommittee level, Mr. Shipley.