Veterans Affairs Committee on Feb. 5th, 2008

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

That's probably the only place where you cross mandates, as I would think that both CCB and CNIB do a certain degree of advocacy.

[Catherine Moore]

Absolutely. CCB was at the table with us with Elections Canada, and it was enormously helpful.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

All right, then, at this stage I'd like to thank our witnesses for their appearance today. I give you credit in the sense that it's kind of like writing an essay. You made sure you told us what you were going to tell us, you told us, and then you told us what you had told us. That's important, because sometimes there's not that focus with regard to presentations. So I appreciate it.

If you don't mind, if committee members wish to say their goodbyes and thank yous, we still have a few items of business to proceed to. So if the committee doesn't mind, I'm just going to move into that, and you're free to just kind of pack up or do as you wish.

First, I'll inform the committee members that we had a victory at the Liaison Committee. With regard to our travel to the four different bases, that is a go. We've had approval for the 10 members, plus research, plus clerk, plus support staff, plus interpreters. So that's all good.

Another thing that may be slightly saddening, maybe for Mr. Russell particularly, is that we did look into the idea of being able to alter the time somewhat with regard to the visitation at Goose Bay. I understand that there's a family matter in your neck of the woods. It would have meant taking a charter flight directly from Cold Lake to Goose Bay, which we understand is longer than a transatlantic flight to Europe, not that I'm opposed to that. But that would have meant leaving Cold Lake that evening, not arriving in Goose Bay until 5 a.m., and then going straight from arriving there on a red-eye to basically getting on the tour. Anyhow, we gave that some consideration but decided that probably the stopover was a better way to do that. We apologize, but we looked at it--

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

That's all you can do.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

--and that's what it came to.

Now, just for edification or knowledge, I signed the per diem form with regard to that travel.

The last thing is with regard to that travel. I believe some committee members brought forward the idea that maybe we'd leave slightly early on one of the days, and that way members can get back for connecting flights to their ridings on Friday.

Mr. St. Denis, do you wish to speak?

[Brent St. Denis, Liberal, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Yes.

For some of us who live in non-metropolitan areas--Mr. Valley, who's up in Kenora, whose car is in Winnipeg, and me in northern Ontario, and maybe some others--for the sake of about an hour and a half, two hours maximum, on Friday afternoon, could we simply leave a little bit earlier on the charter from Goose Bay? I've chatted with my friend here, who feels that we can get the job done there by two o'clock. I'll let him speak for himself, but he thought that might be possible.

I have a family baptism on Saturday morning, not my own child but my sister-in-law's, and I'd have to leave, for example, on the1:50 commercial flight. Roger is in the same boat. Otherwise we don't get home until Saturday. So for the sake of about an hour and a half, if we could tweak, compress, work over lunch, or start as early as Todd can get there from his wedding up the coast, maybe we could get away at around two o'clock or 2:30. We'll have to confirm the times exactly with the company. If it's three hours, with the time zone difference, that's great, because it's like 2:30 to 5:30. There's a seven o'clock flight to Toronto. We're going to arrive at the Shell or Esso Avitat, and we have to get from there over to the main terminal, so we might want to land sometime between 5:30 and six o'clock so we can get cabs over to the main terminal and have enough time. Friday night might be a busy time for security and what not, with Friday night business travel.

If Todd is still okay with that, I'm sure we can get everything done.

I'm not sure how far the base is from the airport.

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

We land at the base.

[Brent St. Denis, Liberal, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Then if we could get out of the room at two o'clock for a 2:30 takeoff, for maybe a 5:30 landing....

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

Okay, just so committee members understand, we're arriving at Goose Bay, I believe, on Thursday evening. Then we'll have the chance to see around the base and talk about the issues and interact and whatever on Thursday and Friday morning and afternoon. So the proposal is to just leave a little bit earlier on Friday, in mid-afternoon instead of in late afternoon.

Go ahead, Mr. Cannan.

[Ron Cannan, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

I concur. It might even make more sense—because I have to fly out of Toronto too—to land in Toronto.

[Brent St. Denis, Liberal, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

You'll get to Toronto probably faster landing in Ottawa. We have all the staff and everything to drop off. This is not a jet, I understand. This is a twin engine, one pilot, kind of “strap your bags to the underbelly”--

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

Every seat is an aisle seat and a window seat.

[Brent St. Denis, Liberal, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Is it a Dash 8?

The reason I raise the speed thing is that I charter in my riding. I have a big riding, and once in a while I charter and I use a medevac plane. This thing goes over 300 miles an hour. It's a twin prop and a turbo prop. It flies. It really makes a difference when you charter to know what kind of plane they're using, because they could use a really slow putt-putt and charge you the same price as a fast one.

There was one trip where we used a jet and, I'll tell you, we got from Ottawa to St. John's in an hour and 15 minutes.

You have to balance costs, time, people's weekend committed to work, and what not.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

Fair enough.

I don't sense that there's any fight on that issue around the table. I think everybody is fairly amenable with being able to make connections and what not on late Friday. I think the clerk and the people who will be coordinating that understand.

With that, I think we've covered everything. The meeting is adjourned.