Transport Committee on May 2nd, 2023

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Ultimately, that's the concern I had, hence the reason for the motion I brought forward to end debate. It was because the Conservatives have quite a lengthy list here. Trying to fit just those people into four meetings is going to be a challenge.

The reason I wanted to bring it to business planning was to give all the parties the opportunity to look at the people they would like to summon to come out within those four meetings. With the limited amount of time that Mr. Bachrach has put forward in his motion—by the way, I might add, his supported and past motion—we should all, as per the usual practice of this committee, have that same opportunity that the Conservatives have now presented to us with respect to their wish to have these individuals summoned to come out to the meeting.

Therefore, we, the Bloc and the NDP should have that same opportunity. Hence, once again—I apologize for being repetitive—it's for the business planning meeting in the subcommittee to establish that. That way, everyone has a fair opportunity to bring members they would like to summon, as the Conservatives have put forward now, for transparency. We can have that same opportunity to bring members we may be interested in summoning.

That's the problem I have right now. If we move on to this motion, we're going to have these people being asked with no opportunity for the Bloc, the NDP or the Liberals to do the same thing. I know we can do that at a future meeting, but it's very hard, because we're going to get into the same debate we're in right now, wasting the time of witnesses we should be listening to. That is the irony behind all of this discussion.

We can just nail it down during a business planning session, which, by the way, wouldn't count as a meeting. It would simply be a business planning session. We can nail down everyone's wishes to have those summoned to come out to this meeting, or to one of the four meetings, and be dealt with. It's very simple.

Now, here we are, spending an hour and a half discussing an issue that could have been dealt with very simply by adjourning debate, dealing with it at the subcommittee and then moving forward with the wishes of all parties in terms of the people that they, all of us, want to present to then be summoned to come out to the committee meeting.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Badawey.

I have Monsieur Barsalou-Duval, followed by Mr. Strahl.

Mr. Bachrach, did you want to add your name to that list?

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Absolutely.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Before I do that, it looks like this discussion may go on a little longer. I'm wondering if there's any objection to my asking the witnesses to leave for the day, out of courtesy.

Seeing no objection, I would like to take a minute to thank the witnesses who are joining us virtually, as well as our two witnesses in person today, for their time. We apologize that we were not able to ask the questions and hear your testimony. We hope to have you back at another point, but for now, unfortunately, we have to continue with the discussion we're having.

I thank you once again. You're free to leave.

Thank you.

Mr. Barsalou‑Duval, the floor is yours.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have a brief comment on what has been said. I'm trying to understand the Liberals' discomfort with the motion. It seems to me that many of the things they asked for or raised have been incorporated into the motion through amendments, including one by Mr. Bachrach.

The motion doesn't propose a list of witnesses for the committee's study, but rather a list of people summoned to appear. Those are two different things. All parties have already had the opportunity to submit their witness lists to the clerk, and I assume that in the way she sets up the witness panels for our committee meetings, she is taking into account the way it is traditionally done.

In my opinion, it's not a question of inviting more witnesses proposed by one person or another, but rather of ensuring that the witnesses who have already been asked to appear and who didn't seem to want to co‑operate will be present so that the committee can do its work properly.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Barsalou‑Duval.

Go ahead, Mr. Strahl.

[Mark Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Hope, BC]

There are a couple of things. I agree with Mr. Barsalou-Duval that these are not new witnesses we have table-dropped here today. These are witnesses that were submitted by the deadline to the clerk and from whom we received indication that they had declined or ignored the request of this committee.

I would invite, as the Bloc Québécois has done.... They also had witnesses, three witnesses here, on their list who either ignored or declined the request. They have added them. We're not pulling these people off the street all of a sudden. The clerk has these witnesses.

I would encourage on the Liberal side, if the clerk has witnesses, to add them to this motion. That is what we're talking about here. We're not talking about reopening the witness list. The witnesses in this motion, both from the Conservatives and from the Bloc, were invited before the deadline and, for one reason or another, did not agree to appear. Those are the witnesses we're talking about. We're not talking about reopening the call for witnesses, as far as I'm aware.

I would also indicate, now that Mr. Bachrach's amendment has been accepted, that the date in the motion would need to change to May 18 in the two places, in part a) and part b). If we're going with a meeting on climate adaptation for infrastructure on Thursday, that would then need to be four meetings by May 18 as opposed to by May 11. That amendment necessitates a change to our original motion.

I know we indicated as well that we would be willing to consider that amendment if the clerk had firm acceptance from the witnesses who were on our original motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Strahl.

Mr. Chahal.

[George Chahal, Liberal, Calgary Skyview, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

There were substantial changes made with the amendment and it's my understanding that some witnesses were dropped today, from what I heard from our colleague, Monsieur Barsalou-Duval. From what our colleague, Mr. Strahl, said, I think we do need an opportunity to review the witnesses and some of the conversations we've had today.

My concern is that now we've gone into a lengthy debate and really wasted the committee's time. Unfortunately, we had to send the folks who were testifying home. I wanted to hear from them today. That's why we started this. We could have done this post-meeting or through committee business. It's extremely unfortunate that the theatrics here have led down a path of wasting our time at committee and not getting any work done. Working on building consensus together has been completely disregarded.

We have another report we're working on and a study that we've been preparing for. I know the clerk has also been preparing to get witnesses. We've all been working on that in good faith by working together.

There's a substantial change with the amendment that was made by Mr. Bachrach. That does also change things. New names were added. We do need to have a conversation on the proportionality and the number of witnesses. With that, I have a number of other witnesses that I think we may need to look at as well.

A lot of conversation has been going on. For the record, could we get a clarification, Mr. Chair, of all the witnesses that are being proposed or have been previously proposed through the study, just so we can have a better idea of the parties and the witnesses' names that have been put forward? It's just so we can be clear.

I got Mr. Barsalou-Duval's witnesses. I believe there are three names. Is that correct?

Could we get an accounting of the names of the witnesses and find out who, so we can make sure? Then I may have others to add as well, or maybe not, depending on what the list is.

That's just to start with.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Chahal.

Are you looking for information right now? Would you like the clerk to read that off for you?

[George Chahal, Liberal, Calgary Skyview, AB]

That would be preferable, just so all our colleagues have an opportunity to have a direct and clear understanding of who they are and where we're at.

Madam Clerk, could you provide that to committee members?

[The Clerk]

Just to confirm, do you need the entire witness list for this study? It's 38 or 39 names.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Chair, I have a point of order. I'm just worried that we're dealing with something that typically isn't public during a meeting. I have no trouble with the witness list being read out, but it just seems not germane to what we're talking about.

If the Liberals have witnesses they're having trouble getting co-operation from, they can add them to the summons list. If there are other witnesses who are co-operative, they can be added to the list. We do have a very informal and effective process, with the clerk's help, of getting witnesses to appear and organizing their schedules.

It just feels like now we're well into the area of just trying to delay the meeting and talk out the clock. We have a motion in front of us. I'm sure the Liberals are going to vote against it. That's fine, but let's get on with voting.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Bachrach.

With regard to your point of whether or not we should be doing this in camera, is it the will of the committee to move in camera?

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

I have a point of order before you move to that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Go ahead, Ms. O'Connell.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you.

In reaction to Mr. Bachrach's point, it was actually Mr. Strahl who said that these witnesses the Bloc have proposed were already submitted, that every party had the chance to submit and that they're only adding them to the summons list.

However, we don't see who each party proposes. That was the point of asking for all 30 witnesses. If the suggestion is that they followed the process, followed the deadline, submitted their witnesses on time and these three were already submitted, how do we know that? We don't see the list. That was what is triggering the request.

If you'd like to do it in a different format, that's fine. The clarity is that Mr. Strahl put on the record that these witnesses were already pursued, but I don't know that and I don't think other members of this committee know that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

I'll go back to you, Mr. Bachrach.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Perhaps the clerk can simply confirm, for Ms. O'Connell's edification, that the witnesses that Mr. Barsalou-Duval added to the summons list were part of the original invitation list.

[George Chahal, Liberal, Calgary Skyview, AB]

Chair, I believe I also have the floor, unless there's another point of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

In order to be able to speak more freely about this and ensure we're able to dive into a discussion about witnesses, can we move in camera? Is there any objection to moving in camera?

[Mark Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Hope, BC]

We'll move back out at the appropriate time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

We'll move in camera, and if it's the will of the committee to move back out of in camera, we can do that, as well.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

On the motion to move in camera, if there is one, I don't see the point, because nothing we're talking about should necessarily be shielded from the public. The public deserves to see how the committee tackles issues like this.

What we've proposed is entirely reasonable. Mr. Barsalou-Duval added witnesses to the list. He has confirmed they were part of the original invitation and that they haven't responded positively to the invitation. We're at a point where we can vote on the motion. The motion is very clear. I don't want to move in camera just so that the decorum of the meeting can decline even further than it already has.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Bachrach.

We'll go to Mr. Rogers, followed by Mr. Chahal.