Veterans Affairs Committee on Feb. 18th, 2016

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Okay. Maybe we can ask the clerk to bring some information on that back to the next meeting. It might be great for all of us to attend that. There are going to be a lot of them there.

The other thing in looking at the schedule, the House schedule we looked at this morning, is are we willing to meet when we're not sitting? For the March-April and June-July periods, I don't know what everybody's schedule is. I guess we can't look that far ahead. May is really busy for all of us. We have three weeks of sitting. For June it depends on when we end, and in April and March we have Easter and March break, I believe. That's something to think about, also.

Ms. Mathyssen.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Chair, in regard to outreach, of course it's important, but very often travelling is most time-consuming. Unless it's something very specific and useful, we might be better to ask for briefings from Veterans Affairs Canada. The bureaucrats can come in, and they can provide a great deal of background information that I'm sure members would find very useful.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you.

I agree with the member. However, I would like to have more than one stakeholder. It's the same with the Legion: it's one stakeholder. They don't represent every veteran. We know that some of our younger veterans are not active members of the Legion. I would propose that we actually open up the scope of consultation, where we're actually engaging people who may not traditionally go through Veterans Affairs.

I'd like to see the full lens.

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Okay.

Mr. Kitchen.

[Robert Gordon Kitchen, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

I agree with you. As you say, veterans affairs is one aspect of it. I would love to have them come to talk to us. We need to talk to other people who don't participate with Veterans Affairs Canada, and who have actually.... If there's an avenue that we can propose to them, whereby they can maybe feel they can have a way to come talk to us, I would like to hear those other aspects from different avenues.

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Would it be too much to ask everybody, between now and, say, Sunday to email us a list of groups you propose, or that anybody proposes we meet with? Then we could have that for our subcommittee on Tuesday.

If we have a subcommittee meeting on Monday, I guess we can set the agenda and everything else we can discuss on Tuesday, if that's fine with everybody. Let's say a Sunday deadline, and anybody's welcome to send that.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Do we send that to you?

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Yes, or you can copy everybody. That's fine.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Perfect.

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Send it to the clerk. How about it we send it to the clerk? Then the clerk can distribute it.

Does anybody want to dig down into the report that was sent out yesterday, which was prepared for us?

Mr. Fraser.

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

Chair, I just want to ask a question here about the process we're going to follow. Today we're going to be having a conversation about the good report that was given to us for consideration. Then the subcommittee is going to meet on Monday to discuss a work plan, and then bring that back to the committee on Tuesday to discuss the subcommittee's work plan.

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Yes. The discussion for us today is in the sense of how these are some things we can look at and put in the work plan. Whether there's anybody who wants to move the whole report and put it in the work plan and move forward....

Before we get a work plan, there really isn't a lot to do.

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

Right, and I see Ms. Mathyssen's motion. I assume we'll be covering that as part of the work plan, in any event.

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Yes, we'll put that on the agenda.

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

We'll take that into consideration when the subcommittee meets to discuss the work plan.

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

We could take that into consideration, yes, correct. Then the motion will be voted on. It will go on Tuesday's agenda.

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

Okay. When there is a work plan, if that's the phraseology we're using, does that actually come before the committee to vote on it, to see if there's agreement?

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

We should have the full committee pass the work plan.

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

All right. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

I know we're moving quickly. Looking at Tuesday, is it feasible we can have a work plan, the rough notes of a work plan, or have it sketched out? We'll do an in camera meeting on Tuesday, have a frank discussion on the work plan, and hopefully, pass it. Then we can move forward.

If there's any outreach to do, and if we agree to that on Tuesday, we can start outreach and get going.

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

May I make a suggestion as well? We talked about an email going to the clerk by Sunday for discussion of what groups we might like to meet with as a committee. If anybody from this committee has thoughts on what things they would like to see in the work plan, would it make sense that they submit those things by Sunday?

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Correct. Yes.

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

Okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Neil Ellis]

Or we could do it on Friday.

[Colin Fraser, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

That's cutting it close.