Evidence of meeting #2 for Veterans Affairs in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was bloc.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
Betty Hinton Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Gilles, did we do it that way last time around? I believe this is just a standard process here. Are we doing something different this time that we weren't...?
3:35 p.m.
Bloc
Gilles-A. Perron Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
Oui, we are doing something different.
We're proceeding differently this time around.
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
Perhaps we could ask the clerk whether there is a typical questioning formula that you start with in most committees, or whether every committee does it differently.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Rob Anders
The clerk is willing to read into the record here the one we operated on previously, if that's any help.
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
Perhaps he could tell us whether the last one is the same or whether there is a difference.
3:35 p.m.
The Clerk of the Committee Mr. Michael MacPherson
You would have to substitute Liberal for Conservative.
3:35 p.m.
A voice
Are you going to read it out now?
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The Clerk
Oh, okay.
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Conservative
Betty Hinton Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Or maybe just answer, is it different from the way it was last time?
3:35 p.m.
The Clerk
I was reading through it to ascertain.... It's rather long.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
3:35 p.m.
The Clerk
It appears to be the same, except you're substituting Conservative for Liberal.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Rob Anders
My sense here is that certainly in the first and second rounds, I think it almost perfectly accounts for the representation we have from all the parties in the House, given the number of Conservatives and Liberals we have. Then when you get to the third round, I sense that it's pretty much bang-on there as well. So it's just an even flow of the representation we have from various parties.
Mr. St. Denis, go ahead, please.
3:40 p.m.
Liberal
Brent St. Denis Liberal Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON
I agree with what you said, that in the first two rounds it represents the makeup of the committee. How often we will get past the second round, I don't know. It will probably be a pretty rare occurrence, so we want to be sure our NDP and Bloc colleagues would be, at the very least, very early in the third round. I might propose that in the third round you just forget the idea of repeating the second round, because you'll never get deep into that third round anyway. Why don't you just go Liberal, Bloc, NDP?
3:40 p.m.
A voice
Why would you leave out the government?
3:40 p.m.
Liberal
Brent St. Denis Liberal Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON
Oh, I'm sorry: Liberal, Bloc, NDP, Conservative. Just go down: Liberal, Bloc, NDP, Conservative.
3:40 p.m.
Liberal
Brent St. Denis Liberal Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON
It is basically repeating round one. You have round one, round two, and then repeat round one, because you'll never get past that third round. I think we will often get past round two, but not very far.
So instead of Betty's suggestion that we repeat round two—
3:40 p.m.
Liberal
Brent St. Denis Liberal Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON
We basically start again at number one; we have only two—
3:40 p.m.
An hon. member
At five minutes, rather than seven.
3:40 p.m.
Liberal
Brent St. Denis Liberal Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON
Maybe you could cut back the time a little bit too.