Evidence of meeting #4 for Status of Women in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was gba.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Eva Nassif Liberal Vimy, QC
I'm not that familiar with that but what if the witness is saying something very personal and we accept, but she or he doesn't want to be in public. Do we decide?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Marilyn Gladu
I believe that maybe the clerk can confirm, but typically if the witness doesn't want to be in public, then they would make that known to us and that would be part of what's sent out to you with the meeting notice.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Marilyn Gladu
Yes, absolutely we have to respect that.
Did I hear a motion that we're going to default to be in public?
Liberal
Anita Vandenbeld Liberal Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
We're going to wait on a motion to see what procedure and House affairs does.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Marilyn Gladu
We'll wait on the motion.
Meanwhile back at the ranch, we will be in public unless a member wants to go in camera, and we'll vote.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
I wanted to add that, as we're thinking that one through, that it can be a majority and not necessarily unanimous.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Marilyn Gladu
Yes, a majority for sure.
The next thing that we talked about was questions that came up regarding the blues distribution.
We had previously agreed that those attending the meeting, including members, assistants, and witnesses, could get hold of the blues distribution. Since then we've had a request today from witnesses who wanted to see the blues from the previous meetings so they could know what kinds of questions were answered. We have had requests from parliamentary assistants and a request from the parliamentary assistant to the RCMP to see the blues.
Would we be willing to open it up so that witnesses are able to access the previous blues, and if we have parliamentary assistants they can see them and the RCMP's parliamentary assistant can see them?
Ms. Damoff and then Ms. Vecchio.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I have a question for the clerk. What's the normal procedure on this and how widely distributed are they?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Marilyn Gladu
Apparently the standard practice is that the folks who are coming as witnesses can get hold of the blues and parliamentary assistants can get hold of them.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Marilyn Gladu
The third one was that the parliamentary assistant to the RCMP has requested access to the blues. I think that's probably because they know we're going to be talking about issues that are potentially related to them. I wouldn't grant that access without the committee's approval.
Ms. Ludwig.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
The only thing I would throw into this, just to keep putting stuff out there, is that the sessions are recorded. I have a student who is working for me at a university and she watches it every day. They could probably get access to the recordings.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Marilyn Gladu
The driver is that it's automated for them to get the blues sent to them, instead of having to go to each different committee meeting. It's sort of an efficiency measure.
I'm not seeing unanimous consent on this one.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I'm confused. The assistant to the RCMP wants to automatically get the blues from our committee, all of them?
The Clerk of the Committee Ms. Andrea McCaffrey
I want to clarify. It's the manager of parliamentary affairs for the RCMP that has requested a copy of the blues. We only circulate the blues that are for public meetings. Any in camera blues, of course, would not be circulated.
They will be able to access these transcripts in about 10 days' time because they will be made public. These are just the unofficial transcripts. These are the blues.
Conservative
Karen Vecchio Conservative Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON
Thank you very much for this clarification.
If it is something that is reported and it is in camera, I believe that we should give that 10-day waiting period when it comes to the RCMP. I believe that is a protocol that has been set there and I respect what you're saying.
I believe it's important to have the transparency. If it's something that's public, then it's easy to send out, but when it's something that's in camera, we do need to respect those persons.
I don't know, but if something needs to have the immediate attention of the RCMP within 24 hours' notice, then at the call of the chair and the committee, it can be immediately shared.
Liberal
Anita Vandenbeld Liberal Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
My understanding, and this is the difference between the recording and the blues, is that the reason for the blues is that you actually have manual typing going on and there could be errors. In a recording, you're visually watching it. It's direct and obviously, there's no issue there.
When you're typing it, the people who spoke should have the ability to review what the transcript says to ensure that it accurately reflects what they said. Therefore, there's a time period in which those corrections can be made before it becomes public.
It seems to me that it should be limited to those who actually spoke in committee and to their personal staff. If there is an error and it does go out to anybody outside, there's an erroneous record that could be out there.
I would say that the blues should remain internal.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Marilyn Gladu
We would be okay with the blues staying internal for people that attend the meetings. We would also allow access for witnesses that are coming to our meeting to see previous blues. Is that correct?