Transport Committee on May 4th, 2023

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 66 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee on Tuesday, March 7, 2023, the committee is meeting to study adapting infrastructure to face climate change.

Today’s meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the House order of Thursday, June 23, 2022. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application.

I would now like to welcome our witnesses.

Appearing before us today, colleagues, from the City of Merritt, is Michael Goetz, mayor, appearing by video conference. From the Ecology Action Centre is Will Balser, coastal adaptation coordinator, appearing by video conference. We have, from the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, Matt Gemmel, director, policy and research. Finally, from the Town of Princeton, Spencer Coyne, mayor, is joining us, once again by video conference.

I would like to inform our witnesses before we begin that we do have some work that we need to do as a committee prior to turning the floor over to you for your testimony. I ask for your patience in advance for that.

I will begin today by turning the floor over to Ms. O'Connell.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I think we may have a path forward, so I'm going to move an amendment. Then I'll speak to it.

I move to amend the motion by deleting everything after the first paragraph and replacing it with the following:

a) summonses be served on Dominic Barton, past Global Managing Director of McKinsey & Co.; Andrew Pickersgill, past Managing Partner of the Canadian Practice of McKinsey & Co.; Janice Fukakusa, Inaugural Board Chair of the CIB; Bruno Guilmette, past Interim Chief Investment Officer and Board Director of the CIB; Steven Robins, Head of Strategy; Bill Morneau, former minister of Finance; Patrick Brown, mayor of Brampton; and Lisa Raitt, Vice-Chair of Global Investment Banking at CIBC, requiring each of them to appear at dates and times to be fixed by the Chair, but no later than Thursday, May 11, 2023; and

b) the Committee strongly urges Annie Ropar, past Chief Financial Officer of the CIB; the Honourable Dominic LeBlanc, Minister of Infrastructure; and Aneil Jaswal, Director, Sector Strategies, to appear no later than Thursday, May 11, 2023; and

c) That the study comprise a total of four meetings in addition to the Tuesday, May 2, 2023, meeting, with a maximum of six witnesses per meeting.

I will send the clerk a copy of that wording, but now that it's on the record, I'd just like to speak to it very quickly, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Please, go ahead.

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

Thank you.

What we debated at the last meeting on Tuesday was the fact that the motion that was moved by the Conservatives really didn't encompass the ability for all parties to have their witnesses. In this amendment I've incorporated the Bloc's—Mr. Barsalou-Duval's—amendment, with the three names that were proposed. I incorporated Mr. Bachrach's amendment in part c), which stipulates the number of meetings. I left all of the Conservative witnesses, with the exception of the witnesses who have already agreed. It think it is heavy-handed to send a summons to a witness who has already agreed. We discussed all of that and we have just simply removed those names. I've incorporated all of the amendments by my colleagues, cleaned up the summons in the original Conservative motion to remove those who have already agreed to appear and left the timing exactly as the original motion proposed.

In addition to that, which was always what we were arguing for and why our colleagues here argued to send this to the subcommittee, all we wanted was to ensure that we had our witnesses as well. We've added the witnesses that the Liberals would like to be summoned, as well as strongly urging these additional witnesses, whom we had previously proposed. I think this is a very fair and reasonable path forward. It has encompassed everyone's requests. Instead of what I think happened at the last meeting, where we were just supposed to accept without having the ability on our side, or on all sides frankly, to contribute to what we felt was the functioning in how we were going to structure these meetings.

Again, this is a unanimous vote in terms of having the study. We had no issues with the witnesses who were coming, but what we wanted was clarity on the number of meetings and to ensure that our witnesses were also included so that there was proportionality—which is a standard practice on committees—and then that we incorporated the other parties' recommendations and amendments as well.

I hope this moves us forward so that we can get to the important study that we are here to study today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Ms. O'Connell.

Mr. Strahl.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I just have a couple of things. I noted that everyone on the past list was included, which is good. We would welcome Mr. Brown and Ms. Raitt to provide their testimony to this committee as well, and part c) remains unchanged from Mr. Bachrach's amendment at the last meeting.

I believe I heard Ms. O'Connell's motion say May 11, and we don't have four meetings between now and May 11 so I'm unsure how that would work. Maybe I misheard that.

I am also told that there is a motion at finance that would see several sections of the BIA moved to this committee, which would take precedence over any other business. We had a motion that's been circulated as well that just gives some more flexibility. I note that Mr. Sabia indicated that he could not meet on May 9 or 11 in his response, so it seems to remove him from the study altogether if that May 11 date is fixed.

We would propose to actually give more flexibility to the witnesses, several of whom, after initially saying they would not come, said that they could not come on those dates. I would just simply propose that we go to a much broader date range to give the clerk and the chair the opportunity to schedule these witnesses. We would suggest that these meetings occur prior to June 8. However, in terms of May 11, at this time, having come to where we are now, that's one week from now and I think we would say that we've seen some movement in the witnesses and this motion will get us to where we want to go, but I think the May 11 date is much too soon.

In that same spirit of collegiality and co-operation, I hope we can come to a date that's more reasonable to schedule everyone who we have now in this motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Strahl.

Before I turn over to you, Mr. Bachrach, is it okay if I turn it over to Ms. O'Connell to address the date? Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In that motion, it was the Conservatives' date of May 11 that was proposed on Tuesday. Yes, the main motion presented by Dr. Lewis had May 11. I did not change the timing. That was your proposed timing, and that was just two days ago. I'm sorry to interject. I just think it's not our date. It's the Conservatives' proposed date.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Ms. O'Connell.

Mr. Bachrach.

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

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

It seems like we're close. I'd love to wrap this up so that we can hear from today's witnesses. I'm a little bit confused because we have a notice of motion that includes the amendment from last meeting. We have an amendment, but my understanding is that the motion from the last meeting is no longer on the floor. I'm just wondering maybe if the clerk could clarify where we are procedurally, because my understanding is that the motion would have to be brought back in some form. We adjourned our last meeting without passing the motion. It feels like it's dead and needs to be revived.

At the same time, I don't want to obstruct this new tone of collegiality we hear from our Liberal and Conservative colleagues. If you want to fast-track things by somehow getting us there in the next 10 minutes, I'm open to your wisdom on that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

It will be a pleasure to do so, Mr. Bachrach. You are right. There are certain procedural steps we have to follow to ensure that this motion is revised and is agreed upon by all parties as adopted.

I'll turn it over to the clerk perhaps to speak more to what steps have to be followed to get that done as expediently as possible.

[Leslyn Lewis, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I'm sorry. Can you repeat that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

If we were to move forward with this revised motion, given the fact that we have your motion on the floor and we have Mr. Bachrach's amendment on the floor, how would we go about doing that? What is the procedure that is appropriate?

[The Clerk of the Committee, Ms. Carine Grand-Jean]

It sounds like the debate adjourned but the committee can choose to resume the debate, so in that case we would have to put a motion to say I want to resume the debate on this motion and get the confirmation that this is a new motion. Usually the procedural steps are that, when we have a motion on the floor and there are amendments, we just need to seek the unanimous consent to withdraw the amendment or motion and then to vote on the new motion. If you have unanimous consent in every case, it's just the will of the committee. In that situation, then we can go and move forward.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Correct me if I'm wrong, Madam Clerk, but what we would have to do is officially have Ms. O'Connell withdraw her amendment and have a UC vote on that, have Mr. Bachrach withdraw his amendment and have a UC vote on that, have Dr. Lewis withdraw her main motion and have UC vote on that, and then have the new motion presented, which is the one agreed upon by everyone. Is that...?

[A voice]

Mr. Albas wants to speak.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

I'll go over to you, Mr. Albas.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Mr. Chair, as a guest here, I recognize that I may be speaking out of turn, because we do have witnesses who are patiently waiting, but it's my understanding that if the committee just agrees—let's go ahead with Ms. O'Connell's plan minus the date—and no one has an issue with any other date or anything else, then we're done. Everything else is moot.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Go ahead, Madam O'Connell.

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

Procedurally, the current amendment is the one that you vote on first.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Go ahead, Madam Clerk.

[The Clerk]

I can confirm what you're saying. We can do this as a procedural thing, as the debate was adjourned at the last meeting, and that will actually be the way to keep going on the topic.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

The only change would be that we would change the date. Is that correct?

[Leslyn Lewis, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

We did not have 48 hours' notice of her motion—

[A voice]

[Inaudible—Editor]