Evidence of meeting #20 for Status of Women in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was amendment.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Andréanne Larouche Bloc Shefford, QC
I just want to remind you that the point of the 30-day period is also to give Quebec and the provinces time to apply the new provisions. It's much more reasonable.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
Are there any questions or comments on that?
Emmanuella, do you have any follow-up or thoughts?
I'm sorry, but I just want to check on this, Andréanne, because maybe I wasn't listening for a second here. On that 30th day, are you saying that's good, that you're good with the 30th day? Are you positive that you're in support of that?
Bloc
Andréanne Larouche Bloc Shefford, QC
Yes, absolutely. I was saying that this period gave Quebec and the provinces time to apply the new provisions.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
Excellent. Thank you so much. I just want to make sure we're on the same page.
Emmanuella has no other comments.
Shall Liberal-5 carry?
Can we have a recorded vote, please?
(Amendment agreed to: yeas 10; nays 0)
Excellent. Thank you so much.
I just want to make sure we have everything going here. Everything looks like it's fine.
Now let's get to the title of this. It is An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Judges Act (violence against an intimate partner).
Shall the title carry?
(Title agreed to: yeas 10; nays 0)
You guys are just being too easy on the chair today.
Shall the bill as amended be carried?
(Bill C-233 as amended agreed to: yeas 10; nays 0)
Excellent.
Shall the chair report the bill as amended to the House?
Is there a question?
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
Yes, it is a question. I was going give two recommendations to go back with the bill.
Do I need to do that now or after we pass the bill? I just want to make sure that when it's reported back, these go with it.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
Hold on for one second.
I've been told I cannot provide recommendations, but I do know that we need to talk about some resolutions that we want to make sure we see in there.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
We did include recommendations when we reported Bill C-71 back, so it must be possible to do that.
Legislative Clerk
Thank you, Madam Chair.
When a committee studies a bill, the only thing that appears in the report on the bill are amendments that were adopted by the committee or clauses that were removed from the bill by the committee. Those are the only things that can appear in the report on a bill.
You could have a second, separate report that's based on the study of the subject matter of the bill. That's where you could do it, but it would be separate from the report of the bill.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
We have a lot to talk about on that, Pam, because you and I are probably already in that next lane thinking, “Where do we go next?” I fully understand where you want to go with that.
Shall the chair report the bill as amended to the House?
(Reporting of the bill to the House agreed to: yeas 10; nays 0)
Shall the committee order a reprint of the bill as amended for the use of the House at the report stage?
(Reprint of the bill agreed to: yeas 10; nays 0)
That's fantastic. Congratulations.
I know that this may not be exactly what people want to see, but we have this bill as a great foundation and it's being reported back to the House next week, so congratulations, guys. We got this all done.
I want to move forward, though, on the discussion that we had, where we were talking about that resolution. We know that there are some things that we want to see and discuss.
Perhaps Philippe can tell me.... I can report the bill back—which I can do—but can I then continue and say, “But we have a heck of a lot more ideas that we have”, where we discuss the things that Leah brought up and discuss the motion or an amendment that was out of order? Is there a way that our committee can report back to the House and talk about some of these issues that we did not address? I know it's different, but we're the status of women committee, so we're always different.
What do you say, Philippe?
Legislative Clerk
No, not really. However, what you could do is address the situation that you have not covered here today or during your studies at third reading.
Liberal
Conservative
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I very specifically remember sitting at the public safety committee having concerns around a number of issues, including a red flag that we were unable to address in the bill, and when the chair reported the bill back, we included those concerns in some way. It happened at committee. I know, I drafted it. I know that it was done. I know you're an amazing legislative clerk and you were probably the person who was sitting in the chair. I don't know how we do it.
Can we pass a resolution here today that...? The chair can report other resolutions back to the House, so could we pass a motion today that the chair report to the House on two issues? She would table the bill, and then we could pass a motion that the status of women calls on the Government of Canada to....
Could we do that?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
Sonia, is it on what we're discussing right now? How can I help you?
Liberal
Sonia Sidhu Liberal Brampton South, ON
Madam Chair, can we let the officials go and then we can discuss it?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
That's a great idea, Sonia.
I would really like to thank the officials who are here with us today. Thank you so much to Shannon, Claire and Melissa for being here to provide your insight on this bill.
I would like to thank you for being witnesses and relieve you from your role here today. Thank you so much.
Philippe, I'm not sure if we're going to get rid of you or not. You might be stuck with us.
Senior Counsel and Team Lead, Criminal Law and Policy Section, Policy Sector, Department of Justice
Thank you very much.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
Thanks, Sonia, for bringing that forward. I appreciate that.
From this discussion that we're having, this may be an opportunity for us to put forward this resolution. This is something that we've all discussed. It's important to everybody, so perhaps we can work on a resolution.
I could say, “Here's a report. I'm reporting it back, but then our committee has also adopted this resolution on this.” Perhaps we can get started on a resolution, because Bill C-233 has opened up a can of worms. We know there's more to be done.
Is that okay? Am I working it okay, or am I just making up my own rules?
Legislative Clerk
At page 776 of House of Commons Procedure and Practice on the report to the House, it says:
The committee is bound by its order of reference—the bill—and may report the bill only with or without amendment to the House. Consequently, the committee may not include substantive recommendations in its report.
And further down the paragraph:
However, there is nothing to prevent a standing committee, under its permanent mandate in the Standing Orders, from presenting a separate report in which it sets out substantive recommendations with respect to the subject matter of the bill.
The chair would report the bill to the House as adopted today with the amendments. Basically, the report would contain all the amendments that were adopted today, and when you table the report, you could also say that there are other recommendations that may come down later on in a separate report from the committee.