Public Accounts Committee on May 9th, 2024

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

First, I would like to know if I am the last one on the list.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

For the moment you are, but it could change.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

I will be quick, because we have 45 minutes left.

We are trying to put people on trial instead of doing what we are here for: to get to the bottom of things and ensure accountability. So I ask all my colleagues to think of the taxpayers who are watching them. There are not many of them, but they are watching us all the same.

I think we are ready to vote, Mr. Chair. I invite my colleagues to put partisanship aside, so that we can work constructively and study the reports, which after all date back to February. I only just found out.

So I hope we can move forward.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you.

Madam Shanahan, we'll go over to you.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

I would like some clarification, because I think the way information is transmitted is a pretty serious matter.

Could the clerk confirm what time the PDF file containing Mr. Nader's motion was created today? We see that it was created at 2:33 p.m. In other words, this means that some committee members had this information before the meeting even started.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

What's the mention of a PDF you received?

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

The PDF of the motion was apparently created just prior to the meeting, at 2:33, which means that Mr. Nater had the information about Mr. Girard prior to your speaking to us about it at 3:30.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Mr. Nater, go ahead.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Yes, absolutely, we created that notice of motion prior to question period today, because we had no confirmation that Mr. Girard had agreed to attend this committee. We also had clarification that Mr. Ossowski was declining our invitation, so we created a motion to summon the two witnesses. It's as simple as that.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Did you have that prior to the other committee members?

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Chair, as Ms. Shanahan would know, we received an email from our clerk saying that Mr. Ossowski had declined, and we had not received any notification from Mr. Girard, which is why we had the impetus to write this motion. That is why I submitted the motion that is before you. It's as simple as that.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Oh, my goodness. I think it is clear.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you.

Clerk, will you call the question on the motion?

Why don't I read it?

I'll have the clerk read it, please.

[The Clerk]

The motion as amended reads as follows:

That John Ossowski and Paul Girard be summoned to appear before the committee on Thursday, May 16, 2024, in relation to the study on “Report 1: ArriveCAN” of the 2024 reports of the Auditor General of Canada, and that members be provided an estimate of the cost of this meeting.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Very good.

[The Clerk]

Shall the motion of Mr. Nater as amended be adopted?

(Motion as amended agreed to: yeas 10; nays 0)

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I'm going to raise the next point. I'll look for comments, and if I don't receive any, I will of course move the meeting in camera.

As previously mentioned, Minister Hajdu has declined to appear to discuss “Report 2—Housing in First Nations Communities”. I just wanted to bring that to everyone's attention.

I see that Mr. Desjarlais has his hand up, so I'll turn things over to him.

Go ahead, Mr. Desjarlais.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and I want to thank all members of our committee for their support on this motion. It was meaningful to me and to first nations across our country to see support—and unanimous support—across party lines for the minister to be invited to be accountable for what is a very serious, sad and deplorable state that's facing my relatives and first nations across the country.

It's been no secret. Auditor general after auditor general has said that this is beyond unacceptable. We know there are still boil-water advisories. We know, from the Auditor General herself, that nothing is being done to address more seriously the issue of who is accountable for these immense failures. Absent the courts, our political entities, for decades and decades, have not contributed fair value towards these failures.

Mr. Chair, I seek your advice in this regard. I understand that a minister may not appear to be held accountable by this committee. It breaks my heart, and I think it certainly will for the first nations I've spoken to, including those of Treaty 6, who were hoping to hear from the minister as to why she wasn't going to be present and how she was going to implement an action plan to see the very issues presented in the Auditor General's report taken seriously.

I believe we cannot summon a minister; we can only invite a minister. I'm troubled by this, because we've now issued an invitation.

Is there any other mechanism, Mr. Chair, that you are aware of by which we can summon a minister—even a deputy minister, I suppose, or someone who represents the government or Indigenous Services Canada—to come to speak to us and our representatives whom we've invited, like the grand chief from Treaty 6, to be held accountable for the conditions in his communities?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Mr. Desjarlais, I have a few thoughts on this, which I've raised with the clerk, but I'd like to hear a few more comments from the floor, if you don't mind.

I see that Mr. Schmale would like to address this issue. There's Mr. Schmale, and I'm looking for others.

Mr. Schmale, you have the floor, sir.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I appreciate this opportunity to speak on this. I am quite happy that the NDP is now seeing that there needs to be respect for taxpayer dollars. Our previous conversation enlightened me to the fact that they do care about that.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, I thought we were talking about first nations housing and Conservative support for my motion.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

That was my first comment.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you, Mr. Desjarlais.

I often allow all members a little drive-by, and all members take them.

Mr. Schmale, you have the floor. Go ahead, please.

He's getting to his main point. I can tell, Mr. Desjarlais.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Thank you.

Just a half-second later I was going to say that I support Mr. Desjarlais' concern and his absolute shock that the Minister of Indigenous Services has refused to come to this committee to speak about the horrible conditions indigenous communities face for housing. I should also point out, as vice-chair for the indigenous and northern affairs committee, that Minister Hajdu has declined our invitations to attend. In fact, there were multiple invitations to that minister. She was even invited to come to the committee to talk about supplementary estimates (B). She has yet to come to that committee to talk about supplementary estimates (B), and you know how long ago that was. I believe we now have her coming in on the Thursday after the break week to talk about the estimates, but even that is cutting it close.

That department continues to get extraordinarily large in terms of the people who are going into that department, yet we are seeing the results go down and the outcomes go down. That has been proven by the Auditor General, the Parliamentary Budget Officer and many others. We are seeing that ongoing issues with Jordan's principle, non-insured health benefits, housing, drinking water, etc., are not getting better. The fact that this minister refuses to show up to either committee, one of which is looking after indigenous and northern affairs, is absolutely shameful.

It has been pointed out to me—this potentially is an issue for this committee to deal with, and perhaps we'll get to it at the INAN committee as well—that we can actually ask the House to compel the minister to come to this committee and answer these very important questions.

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you, Mr. Schmale.

Mr. Desjarlais, you have the floor, sir.