Evidence of meeting #11 for Public Accounts in the 41st Parliament, 2nd session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cbsa.
A video is available from Parliament.
NDP
Alain Giguère NDP Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC
Will they send the information through you or should I ask for it myself?
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
I think the request should come from you, and you can ask for it to come directly to you. At some point it needs to come to the clerk because everybody needs to see it.
If you want to send it, and send a copy to the clerk, and ask that the response be forwarded to the clerk, that would close all the circles. The important thing is that whatever any member receives from our witnesses, it's shared with everyone. That would be the key thing.
Some circumstances would have me saying differently, but I think in this case the fair thing is for you to initiate a detailed question, providing the background material and asking for answers to be forwarded to the clerk.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Okanagan—Coquihalla, BC
Mr. Chair, I understand that you want to give discretion to individual members, but again, if the testimony has not been heard today and it doesn't directly relate to the questions in the report, I don't think it would be appropriate to be entering any additional answers as testimony. To me, that's why we have a hearing, to have all those things mentioned. I think Mr. Giguère was actually outside the report somewhat.
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
Yes. I'm not surprised I'm hearing from you. We're getting into areas that are not exactly defined. You will note that I worded it that way. It was a personal follow-up. At this point I don't see it finding its way into our report because it wasn't germane. It's a judgment call that Alex would have to make, and then, as he did at our last meeting, he would provide an explanation to the committee as to why something is in or out of the draft.
If it were directly pertinent, then we would get into an issue of how long we would hold up the report to receive that answer. I don't believe we're into that.
I do agree with you that this is somewhat outside where the report will be, but as I mentioned, this is the one area for all members where we try as much as possible to give people a little more room than the House provides because it's very constrained as to what you can say and what you can do. The tradition of standing committees in a parliamentary system, at least ours, is that there be a little more latitude. In this case, I felt that it was all right, similar to Mr. Simms' question, similar to Mr. Van Kesteren's. They weren't necessarily exactly drawn from the report but they were germane, and I didn't see any reason to shut them down. But I do not see this per se as something that we need to hold up our work for.
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
You will also notice that I was very careful—at least I tried to be—in the instructions I was giving to our witnesses in terms of their response, that they would respond as best they could. I think I made a reference that hopefully Mr. Giguère would be happy. But you will see that it wasn't quite the same if it was a detailed question about something in the report. A vague response wouldn't suffice. In this case it's in that category.
Have I explained myself enough?
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Okanagan—Coquihalla, BC
Yes, I think I understand what you're talking about. To me the concern is, if it didn't come up in the hearing and it isn't directly related to the Auditor General's report and its findings, we wouldn't find that this issue would be in our eventual report because we didn't hear this at the testimony.
The chair has to show some discretion here, and I appreciate your explaining that.
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
Thanks. If we can stay in that cooperative let's-be-friends zone and see how this goes, I think we'll be all right. If the answers come back beforehand, though, then it would go from the clerk over to Alex, and Alex would make a judgment call on whether he thought it was in there. As I said, then we have the follow-up system that we have.
On this point further, Mr. Harris.
NDP
Dan Harris NDP Scarborough Southwest, ON
This is just a very quick comment. Until we actually receive the answers from the witnesses, we don't know how pertinent or relevant they will be. Absolutely, it should be up to the analyst's discretion as to how relevant it is. Then we can talk it out during the report writing stage.
Conservative
Stephen Woodworth Conservative Kitchener Centre, ON
Thank you.
The other comment I would have is that the question that needs to be answered is whatever question was put here today to the witness. I think it might be inappropriate if any one of us was to go off and start on our own asking other questions about unrelated matters. I hope that it will stay within the confines of the question that was put today.
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
Thank you.
If there are no further points on that we'll follow through that way.
Again, I and this committee have the undertaking from you, Chief Superintendent Slinn, and from you, Monsieur Bolduc, that those action plans will be here in the clerk's office tomorrow.
Director General, Support Services for Federal Policing, Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Yes.
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
That's very good, thank you.
With that, unless there are interventions from colleagues, and seeing none, I'll thank our witnesses. We appreciate your answers. For the most part they have been very fulsome and very helpful, and the Auditor General should keep up the great work. We love the work you do.
Thank you, witnesses. Thanks, everyone.
Colleagues, this committee now stands adjourned.