Evidence of meeting #2 for Veterans Affairs in the 43rd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was meeting.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Conservative
Dane Lloyd Conservative Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB
I appreciate the words of the parliamentary secretary. I'm comfortable with Thursday's meeting being a more general meeting with Veterans Affairs Canada. However, I want my motion to stand so that, at the earliest convenience of the veterans ombudsman, we can bring him in, as well as bring back Veterans Affairs Canada officials, just so that we can have the two sides of the story so that we can examine it. We don't necessarily need to talk.... We can ask the Veterans Affairs officials questions on the subject, I assume, but I'm comfortable having our next meeting on Thursday be related to backlog issues and general issues. Then, at the next available meeting when the veterans ombudsman is ready, we can bring back department officials with him to do a specific meeting just on that issue.
Can we get this called to a vote?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bryan May
Yes, I just want to make sure that we have the language clear in the amendment. It would be, “That the committee immediately invite the Veterans Ombudsman, at his earliest convenience, and officials from Veterans Affairs Canada to give testimony and answer questions related to changes in mental health services for families of veterans.”
Do you want to insert that first sentence or just eliminate it?
Conservative
Dane Lloyd Conservative Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB
Yes, let's put the first sentence in the second half.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bryan May
Okay, the first sentence was, “Given recent media reports that family members of veterans are being denied ongoing coverage for previously covered mental health treatments.”
Sean.
Liberal
Sean Casey Liberal Charlottetown, PE
I would like to propose an amendment to the motion, to add the words “and that no more than one meeting be dedicated to this inquiry”.
Conservative
Dane Lloyd Conservative Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB
I appreciate MP Casey's note on this. I don't believe it's going to go over one meeting, but I don't want to put it in the motion to restrict ourselves, because if the veterans ombudsman or Veterans Affairs Canada does cite some things that we think are issues, then we want to be flexible to say that we might need to have a second meeting on this. That being said, I don't believe it's going to go over one meeting. I don't accept the amendment, but I appreciate where it's coming from.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bryan May
For clarification, this Thursday, we're not discussing this motion. The “one meeting” threw us for a second there.
Go ahead, Will.
Liberal
William Amos Liberal Pontiac, QC
I would like to ask Mr. Lloyd the question again, because I think it’s an important one.
I would like to vote in favour of the motion, but I do not think we need a blank cheque in order to move forward. We have already discussed what we want to do at the subcommittee meeting. In my opinion, if we want to have more than one day, we should have a completely different discussion.
I think that is the best way to move forward and that we will have full support if we agree to do the study in one day.
Conservative
Dane Lloyd Conservative Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB
I appreciate MP Amos's thinking on this. Unless there is something that just glaringly needs to be addressed by a second meeting, I can say for myself that I won't be pushing for a second meeting on this. I am asking for a bit of a blank cheque on this one, but I hope you will trust that we're not going to try to turn this into a two- or three-meeting thing. We just want to deal with the issue at hand. If there are serious issues, I think it will be self-evident to the entire committee that they need to be dealt with. I think that, as a committee, we can work collectively on this.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bryan May
In order to move forward, I will remind MP Lloyd that he can do that after the fact if there is something that comes out. There's no reason you can't move a motion at that point as well.
We have the amendment in front of us from Mr. Casey, which would include that “no more than one meeting be dedicated to this inquiry”.
(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])
Now we go to the main motion as previously amended.
(Motion agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])
The clerk will do their best to try to get some clarification on when the first available opportunity would be to bring in the ombudsman and the officials on this.
We'll suspend to go back to the original committee business and get back to the report from the subcommittee.
[Proceedings continue in camera]
