HEAL Committee Meeting
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37th PARLIAMENT, 3rd SESSION
Standing Committee on Health
EVIDENCE
CONTENTS
Tuesday, February 17, 2004
| Á | 1110 |
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The Clerk of the Committee |
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Ms. Susan Whelan (Essex, Lib.) |
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The Clerk |
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Hon. David Kilgour (Edmonton Southeast, Lib.) |
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The Clerk |
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Mr. Svend Robinson (Burnaby—Douglas, NDP) |
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The Clerk |
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Mr. Jay Hill (Prince George—Peace River, CPC) |
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The Clerk |
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The Clerk |
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The Chair (Ms. Bonnie Brown (Oakville, Lib.)) |
| Á | 1115 |
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Hon. David Kilgour |
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The Chair |
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Hon. Susan Whelan |
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The Chair |
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The Chair |
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Hon. Susan Whelan |
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The Chair |
| Á | 1120 |
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Mr. Rob Merrifield (Yellowhead, CPC) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Rob Merrifield |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Rob Merrifield |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Svend Robinson |
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The Chair |
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The Chair |
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The Chair |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Réal Ménard (Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, BQ) |
| Á | 1125 |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Jay Hill |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Jay Hill |
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The Chair |
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Hon. David Kilgour |
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The Chair |
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Hon. Gilbert Normand (Bellechasse—Etchemins—Montmagny—L'Islet, Lib.) |
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The Chair |
| Á | 1130 |
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Mr. Greg Thompson (New Brunswick Southwest, CPC) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Svend Robinson |
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The Chair |
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Hon. Susan Whelan |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Svend Robinson |
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The Chair |
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Hon. David Kilgour |
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The Chair |
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Hon. David Kilgour |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Rob Merrifield |
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Mr. Jay Hill |
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The Chair |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Rob Merrifield |
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The Chair |
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Hon. Susan Whelan |
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The Chair |
| Á | 1135 |
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Mr. Svend Robinson |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Svend Robinson |
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The Chair |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Réal Ménard |
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The Chair |
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Mr. James Lunney (Nanaimo—Alberni, CPC) |
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The Chair |
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Mrs. Nancy Miller Chenier (Committee Researcher) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Rob Merrifield |
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The Chair |
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Hon. Susan Whelan |
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The Chair |
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Hon. Susan Whelan |
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The Chair |
| Á | 1140 |
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Mr. Svend Robinson |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Réal Ménard |
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The Chair |
CANADA
Standing Committee on Health |
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EVIDENCE
Tuesday, February 17, 2004
[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
Á 
(1110)
[English]
The Clerk of the Committee: Honourable members of the committee, I see a quorum. We can now proceed to the election of the chair.
Are there any nominations?
Ms. Whelan.
Ms. Susan Whelan (Essex, Lib.): I move that Bonnie Brown be elected chair of the committee.
The Clerk: Are there further nominations?
Seeing none, I declare Ms. Brown to be chair of the committee.
We'll now proceed to the election of the vice-chairs.
Mr. Kilgour.
[Translation]
Hon. David Kilgour (Edmonton Southeast, Lib.): I nominate Mr. Gilbert Barrette for Vice-Chair.
[English]
The Clerk: The nomination is for the government vice-chair.
[Translation]
Are there any other nominations?
[English]
Seeing no further nominations,
[Translation]
I declare Mr. Barrette elected as Government Vice-Chair.
I am now ready to receive motions for the position of Opposition Vice-Chair.
Mr. Robinson.
Mr. Svend Robinson (Burnaby—Douglas, NDP): I nominate Mr. Réal Ménard.
[English]
The Clerk: Mr. Ménard.
Are there further nominations?
Mr. Jay Hill (Prince George—Peace River, CPC): Yes, I nominate Rob Merrifield.
The Clerk: Mr. Hill nominates Mr. Merrifield.
Are there any further nominations?
Since more than one candidate has been nominated, pursuant to Standing Order 106, I'm authorized to preside over the election of the vice-chair by secret ballot.
Á (1109)
Á (1114)
The Clerk: Mr. Merrifield having received the majority of votes, I declare him the vice-chair of the committee.
The Chair (Ms. Bonnie Brown (Oakville, Lib.)): Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen, for the support you've shown. I'm hoping the attendance I see here today is predictive of what we can expect over the weeks to come, although I won't hold my breath waiting.
I want to introduce to you our new clerk, Carmen DePape, who will be assisting us. Our previous clerk is a very progressive male who has gone on parental leave to take care of his children while his wife goes back to work. As with all things with the health committee, you will see that we try to be very progressive and responsive to the issue that is number one in Canadians' minds.
For those of you who are new, the health committee spent a lot of tax dollars last fall, as do all committees when they travel. We did that to reach out to people all over the country on the issue of prescription drugs. It included costs; it included adverse affects; it included the analysis and processing of applications for approval—a very interesting study. Unfortunately, with the early closing of the House, we did not bring it to fruition.
I have not met with the minister, so I don't know if the minister has something in mind for us. But barring that, I'm hoping we might get some agreement to move forward and try to close down that piece of work, so that it ends up we did not waste the money we spent when we travelled. There's a great deal of information, and I'm going to ask the....
Before I do that, I think we had better move to these motions.
Á (1115)
Hon. David Kilgour: On a point of order, would it be possible for us to move all of these as one motion?
The Chair: I was just going to say that. Certain of them are the same for every committee. I think Ms. Whelan has done a grouping. I would ask her to read the numbers she wishes to group slowly, so that people can grasp the topic. Then I think certain of them can be moved pretty easily. We'll go back to the ones that might require a bit of discussion.
Ms. Whelan.
Hon. Susan Whelan: Madam Chair, if I could I'd like to move the first one, respecting the services of the Library of Parliament; the second one, which is the motion to receive and publish evidence in the absence of a quorum; the fourth one, which is payment of witnesses' travel and living expenses; the fifth one, which is distribution of documents with translation; number six, which deals with working meals; number seven, concerning in camera meeting transcripts; number eight, involving notice of substantive motions; number nine on treatment of order in council appointments; and number eleven, dealing with purchasing documents. I'd like to move these as a group.
The Chair: Okay, that is the group Ms. Whelan is putting forward. Does everybody agree? Those in favour of that grouping passing, please so indicate.
(Motion agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])
The Chair: We omitted number three. That caused a bit of concern in the previous committee. It took us about three meetings to get this worked out.
Now that we're authorized to hire the Library of Parliament, I wonder if our regular researchers would like to join the table. Perhaps they can remind me of the agreement we reached last time. Then I can put it before you to see if it's still agreeable.
Oh, good, the clerk has it.
It's that all questioning of witnesses be limited to five minutes per member and that the chair direct the first two questions to members of the Alliance. In the past, the Alliance as the official opposition could decide whether or not they wanted to take the first ten minutes for one person or whether they wanted to divide it in two and have two members for five minutes each or three members for three minutes each. But they did get the first 10 minutes.
The second five minutes went to the Bloc Québécois as the second opposition party. Then we began going to and fro. As we got towards the end of the meeting, with maybe 40 minutes to go, I would say: we have 40 minutes; we have so many members who haven't spoken yet; I'm now going to shrink the five minutes to three in order to fit, to give everybody a chance. That's what we did before.
Ms. Whelan.
Hon. Susan Whelan: Madam Chair, I would like to offer an alternative. In the past, in different committees I've participated in, I've always felt committee members are to be treated as equals. I think it should go back and forth between the opposition and the government members, and everyone should be limited to five minutes, and it should go back and forth between the different parties as well. I think that encourages better participation by all parties and all members of the committee. I would like to see the committee be able to work in a more amicable fashion—recognizing there are obviously partisan differences, but I think as members of Parliament we are to be on this committee as equals.
The Chair: The clerk is pointing out that the standard motion, number three, the one we omitted from the group, actually accommodates what Ms. Whelan is saying in that it limits the time of witnesses, which we usually limit, depending; if we have one witness, we're not going to give that witness five minutes, but if we have a panel of witnesses.... You know what I mean. So that part about the witnesses is different.
Then we move on to the questioner. It suggests that it alternates between government and opposition members.
Mr. Merrifield, Mr. Robinson, and then Mr. Ménard.
Á (1120)
Mr. Rob Merrifield (Yellowhead, CPC): I don't necessarily have a problem alternating between government and opposition. Our point is that we're official opposition, and what was happening, or what was being proposed before, is that it would come to us for just one five-minute round and then go down to the Bloc and NDP. We feel this would not be appropriate. As official opposition, we feel that if we're going to go down the table, back and forth, that's fine, but not necessarily Liberal or...we would start it off, and then Liberal, and then you'd come back to us, and then Liberal, and back to us....
The Chair: Are you suggesting that all three members of the Alliance would come in before the Bloc?
Mr. Rob Merrifield: Well, at least two.
The Chair: Okay. But it would be toing and froing.
Mr. Rob Merrifield: Yes, that's fair enough. I don't mind that.
The Chair: Okay.
Mr. Robinson would like to comment.
Mr. Svend Robinson: It may be fair enough from the perspective of the Conservative Party, but it's not fair enough in terms of the committee as a whole, I would suggest. In fact, I even have some concerns about Ms. Whelan's proposal. I've sat on a number of committees over the years I've been here, and there has always been a recognition that in the first round of questioning, particularly when you have a minister....
Frankly, I don't have a problem with Ms. Whelan's proposition if we're talking about witnesses who are appearing before the committee generally from civil society, government witnesses, and so on. But when we're talking about a minister, there's an understanding that the opposition has their first round with the minister--and we have a number of former ministers here--because there's a recognition that government members, frankly, have more access to ministers. So perhaps the understanding could be that, subject to ministers' appearances, in which case there would be the initial round, down the opposition side, with the time that.... Of course, five minutes is not enough with a minister. You need at least ten.
In any event, I would just suggest to Ms. Whelan that subject to that one amendment, with the clear understanding that this is not about the Conservative Party having more time than other opposition parties...because I haven't sat on another committee in this House where this has happened. For some reason, in this committee, perhaps because of historical precedence or whatever, the Conservative Party gets twice as much time on the first round as do other opposition parties. My friends on the government side will recognize that this is....
No, but in terms of the way the committees function, on that first round, in every committee except this one, there is equal time given to opposition members. If Ms. Whelan's proposal is that we would start with the Conservatives, then to the Liberals, then to the Bloc, then to the Liberals, back again, and to the NDP, subject to ministerial appearance, with equal time, I wouldn't have a problem with that.
The Chair: Okay.
Well, I'm hearing from both ends of the table that there is an agreement that with general witnesses or, say, government officials, we could go back and forth.
Some hon. members: No.
The Chair: No, but you would start there. You would lead, we would come to this side, then we would have the second Conservative member and then a Liberal--
Some hon. members: No.
The Chair: --and then a Bloc member, and then a Liberal.
Some hon. members: No.
The Chair: Well, that's the way it was being described.
Mr. Ménard, and then Mr. Hill.
[Translation]
Mr. Réal Ménard (Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, BQ): I don't have a problem with the official opposition using the 10 minutes allocated to it as it sees fit. If it wants to divide the time among two or three representatives, then it is free to do so. The next questioner, who has five or ten minutes, is a representative of the second opposition party in the House. Then it's on to the government representative, and then back to the original rotation. That's how we proceeded in the past.
Naturally, I agree completely with Svend Robinson in the case of ministers. When ministers are testifying before the committee, it's clear that the opposition has a responsibility to question the government. No one disputes that fact. However, I don't agree with the time allocation of ten minutes and five minutes. In my view, the first two parties should have the right at all times to question witnesses appearing in committee. For subsequent rounds of questioning, the opposition and government parties should alternate.
We understand that government members have a role to play. Every member should be able to put questions to witnesses, regardless of who they are. We agree that all government members should have an opportunity to speak, but we also need to understand that as far as time allocation is concerned, the first person to ask questions should be a representative of the Conservative Party, followed by a Bloc member. Then, it's the turn of the Government representative, followed by the NDP. I don't have a problem with the Conservative Party having a little more time, because it's the official opposition and the same approach is taken for Question Period. Where I do have a problem is with the next question going to a Government member.
Á (1125)
[English]
The Chair: Okay.
He's described what we've been doing. We had another position put forward by Ms. Whelan, which I thought I had agreement with, but I don't think so now.
I'm wondering, as this is our first meeting, if you want to bat this around more or whether you want the researchers, or maybe the clerk, to try to capture, in a couple of motions, two or three possibilities. We could put them on the table at the next meeting and you could pick the one you like, provided they get them out to you.
Mr. Jay Hill: Just before you do that, Madam Chair, I have a point I'd like to make.
The Chair: Okay, Mr. Hill.
Mr. Jay Hill: In reference to the motion by Ms. Whelan, part of the problem I've always had is that I do believe fundamentally in the equality of committee members. Therefore, I do agree, and have agreed on other committees on which I've served, that the government members often get shortchanged. They have the most members on the committees, they have the most members in the House, and the reality is that they should have equal time with the opposition as a whole, in my estimation.
That said, I think if you're going to look at equality, which was the basis of Ms. Whelan's argument, you have four members now from the Conservative Party, not three, who sit on this committee because of the merger with the Progressive Conservatives and the Canadian Alliance, and you have two Bloc and only one NDP, which is roughly representative of their numbers in the House of Commons, of their numbers elected to Parliament. If you're going to talk about equality, the questioning logically should be in proportion to the numbers sitting here. Why would you want to punish any member here any more than you would over there, who doesn't get their equal time just because they happen to belong to the Conservative Party? We get only two slots and then it goes to the NDP, who has only one member on the committee, when we have four? I don't think that's logical.
So I would put that forward. If the assistants are going to go away and come up with some motions, and they're going to look at equality, then they should look at equality by members on the committee, not which party they belong to, which I think was the basis of Ms. Whelan's argument.
The Chair: Mr. Kilgour.
Hon. David Kilgour: I have to admit, with great embarrassment, that I haven't sat on a committee for ten years, so I'm a real beginner. Why don't we look at what other committees are doing? In agriculture, for example, we have seven minutes each--
The Chair: Pardon me for interjecting, but what happens then is that the last few members on the government side and the last couple of members on the opposition side never get a chance. All of us in this particular profession could go for seven, ten, or fourteen minutes pretty easily. So by imposing a discipline on ourselves, it usually means that everybody gets a chance, except in the rare circumstances where the witnesses go on forever.
Mr. Normand.
[Translation]
Hon. Gilbert Normand (Bellechasse—Etchemins—Montmagny—L'Islet, Lib.): After listening to the Conservative and Bloc Québécois members, I think our way of doing things in the past was satisfactory to everyone and the status quo should be maintained. There's no point reinventing the wheel. When you have a formula that works, why change it?
[English]
The Chair: Everyone's trying to be both fair and make sure they get their say, which I understand.
I'm wondering if you would go back. Let's think of that proposal whereby the staff puts together two or three alternate ways of doing it and presents it to you at the beginning of the next meeting. Without much debate I would hope at that time, we could vote in some way, and maybe we could come up with a way of voting that would preclude debating. People could pick the one they like or put them in order of priority--I like this one best, I like this one second best--and we do some kind of quiet counting. Because I don't think it's really clear. I interpreted what Ms. Whelan said one way, and it was interpreted differently over there. So I think it's always safer to have it in words on paper.
I would just put one thing out there. I heard the idea that the entire opposition gets to ask a minister questions before the Liberals come. I don't know--I've not been a minister--but I think that's pretty hard on the minister, not even having a break from one questioner half way down the line.
Á (1130)
Mr. Greg Thompson (New Brunswick Southwest, CPC): That's why they get the extra pay.
The Chair: Well, usually we had the same system when the minister came. Anyway, we're going to have to incorporate special rules for ministers.
Okay, we now have...are you happy with that?
Mr. Svend Robinson: Absolutely, yes. I hope it is clear, though, that whatever propositions are brought back to the committee will distinguish between the appearance of the minister and other witnesses.
The Chair: Yes, I just asked that. Okay.
We now know what we're doing about number three--we're going to decide later. We're deferring.
On number 10, Ms. Whelan omitted it and perhaps she'd like to tell us why.
Hon. Susan Whelan: It's my opinion that in camera meetings should stay in camera amongst members. There's no reason for us to have staff members present. I often had to listen to gossip and talk in the halls of what went on in in camera meetings, and I would prefer that in camera meetings are just with the members of the committee.
The Chair: Mr. Robinson.
Mr. Svend Robinson: I disagree. I think there are times when a member is not able to attend, and it's obviously very useful to be able to be briefed by one's staff, if you're not able to attend, as to input for the meeting and so on.
I'm not aware of there having been any abuse of that in this committee, and in the absence of that, I don't understand why the practice wouldn't continue.
The Chair: Mr. Kilgour.
Hon. David Kilgour: Can we vote on the two points of view?
The Chair: Well, there's a middle ground here. My feeling is if the member is present, staff needn't be. That's just my opinion. If the member is travelling with another committee, I can understand Mr. Robinson's point.
So we could go with Ms. Whelan's idea but then limit it from the perspective that if one of the members has to go with another committee, one of their staff persons could observe the meeting. But only if the member is absent.
What do you think of that?
Hon. David Kilgour: And will members have to provide documentation that they are travelling with another committee?
The Chair: Yes. It would have to be that there is a serious reason why they're not here in the sense that they're at another committee, which is maybe doing clause-by-clause, or they're travelling with another committee, or they're travelling maybe with a minister, out of the country--something like that, not just that they're sitting in their offices making phone calls and sending their staff to standing committees. But I'm sure that won't happen. It isn't known to happen.
Mr. Rob Merrifield: Hopefully, we will do very little work in camera, because it's not really what we should be doing. We should be open and transparent as much as possible in whatever decisions are made.
Mr. Jay Hill: Even the new prime minister says that.
The Chair: The researcher has come up with some wording: “Unless otherwise ordered, each committee member be allowed to have one staff person present at in camera meetings if the member himself or herself is not present for a documented reason”. And we will have an understanding that a documented reason means a serious obligation outside of the possibility of coming to this meeting.
Is that okay with people? Okay.
Mr. Kilgour is moving that. All in favour?
(Motion agreed to)
The Chair: Okay, we've finished with this. We have a little leftover business for the next meeting.
Mr. Merrifield has a point.
Mr. Rob Merrifield: The notice of motion, I think, is being distributed, or will likely be distributed. I would just like to put this on 48-hour notice.
The Chair: But this is for 48 hours?
Hon. Susan Whelan: Yes, we will discuss that at the next meeting, whenever that next meeting is.
The Chair: I'm going to beg the indulgence of the committee for a minute because we are on to when the next meeting will be.
Á (1135)
Mr. Svend Robinson: I also just wanted to give notice of a motion—and I will make a copy available to the clerk—that the health committee immediately undertake to conduct a study on the health effects and alternatives to consuming trans fatty acids. There is some additional information on that. My colleague Pat Martin will likely be present at the committee to move the motion when it comes forward, but I'm giving notice now.
The Chair: You have a bill on this?
Mr. Svend Robinson: Yes, he's got a motion before the House as well.
The Chair: Okay, it's a motion—and a bill, I think, which might be referred to us anyway. We'll deal with these two motions at the next meeting.
I'm going to beg your indulgence because I cannot be here on Thursday. I think Mr. Barrette and I, and maybe Mr. Merrifield too, should probably have a little meeting with the minister to see what he's thinking about for us, so we have an idea of what's out there around the issue of health from the point of view of the government's mind, and what it might expect of us.
I would suggest to you that the next meeting of the health committee would be next Tuesday at 11.
Is that agreeable to everyone?
Some hon. members: Agreed.
The Chair: Great.
I would also suggest that the research staff begin to send to you whatever they can put together, to get the new members up to speed on the topic that the former members were studying last fall.
So I would ask, even though there's not a meeting, that people could do a little bit of reading and get a bit up to snuff on the issues that were emerging.
Mr. Ménard.
[Translation]
Mr. Réal Ménard: Would you like us to submit a list of possible agenda items to the clerk. We won't have much time. I don't know how much time you plan to set aside to complete this study, but perhaps we can do as we did last time around, that is submit a list of two or three topics that we would like to focus on, aside from the study on drug costs. That way, when we next meet on Tuesday, we'll have an idea of Members' concerns. We could submit our list of two or three possible items to the clerk or researcher by Friday. That will give us some idea. Of course, we're not going to have a lot of time, but it would be helpful, just in case we do have some time to spare.
[English]
The Chair: I have seen these lists of two or three topics, and usually when every member sends a couple of topics in, we end up with 40 topics and have to prioritize them
I don't know if you want to get into that work plan mood right now, or whether you'd first like to clean up what was started and then listen to what might come to us, such as Pat Martin's private member's bill, or whether you want to get into this big whole, what I call, long-term strategic planning exercise. I think we could waste several meetings doing that.
Mr. Lunney.
Mr. James Lunney (Nanaimo—Alberni, CPC): Just to remind the committee, we have a private member's bill that has been referred to the health committee. It is one of five private members' bills that were reinstated after the throne speech. It's Bill C-420 on the subject of natural health products, which has a limited time for us to respond to it.
The Chair: So we already have one bill. We have an unfinished study, and we already have one bill.
Do we have anything else?
Mrs. Nancy Miller Chenier (Committee Researcher): The estimates will be coming.
The Chair: The estimates will be coming; that's why I'm not sure about new topics.
However, Mr. Robinson has his in the form of a motion, so we have to deal with it.
Mr. Merrifield.
Mr. Rob Merrifield: Yes. Further to the discussion, because I think it's to the advantage of the new members of committee to understand what's coming, there's a private member's motion that was drawn on Friday and that will be coming forward in the House with regard to 48 hours' notice, to make sure that physicians report adverse reactions to medications. This is something we heard a horrendous amount on, and we are starting to hear about it on television. Tonight I think there will be a full-blown story on it on Disclosure.
It's all flowing out of this, but I certainly would solicit the support of the health committee for that private motion, to at least get dialogue going to make sure we get adverse reactions reported in this country. Tens of thousands of deaths hang in the balance.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Merrifield.
Ms. Whelan, and then Mr. Robinson.
Hon. Susan Whelan: I have a question, Madam Chair.
Normally, the committees I've served on in the past have had steering committees. I didn't see that as one of the motions before us today, so I'm just wondering why that would be, because there has often been a steering committee of the committee that has worked out some of these issues and timeframes together.
That being said, I am more than happy to work as a full committee, but I do think there needs to be an opportunity to have that kind of discussion on topics and issues down the road.
The Chair: We established that we'd decide about the time allocation at the next meeting--the possibility.
Hon. Susan Whelan: I think we need to have something in front of us as to what's on the table to have that discussion. That would be my only point. Because some people are coming from the experience of having served on the committee and others of us are very new to this committee and would like to have some input into the--
The Chair: Well, as a person who has been on this committee for a long time, I want to tell the new members that there is a constant sales pitch that goes on here. Everybody on this committee has an idea about what will make Canadians' health better and they're constantly pitching that the committee study it. In the meantime, you will get letters from groups all over the country asking you to push the health committee to study a subject that is dear to their heart. So we have to get ready for the fact that people are all going to be pushing certain items and be firm about what it is we're actually going to do, as opposed to switching gears all the time.
Mr. Robinson.
Á (1140)
Mr. Svend Robinson: First of all, I agree with Susan about a steering committee. I think the committee works more effectively if there is some opportunity to have some of these discussions ahead of time in a body that represents all of the parties on the committee.
But I also just wanted to follow up on your point, Bonnie, about the work the committee has done so far. We've spent a great deal of time travelling across the country from coast to coast hearing from Canadians about their concerns in the area of pharmaceutical drugs. The reality is that subject to a pretty revolutionary change, we may be into an election within a matter of six to eight weeks. So realistically, we may have four working weeks in this committee. I'm not sure at all, Susan, but that's what they tell me. We can have all the grandiose plans in the world, and I can bring forward motions on trans fats and everything else, but the reality is that the work of this committee is coming to an end.
I would hope that at the very least, before the end of March this committee could make some recommendations based on all that evidence we heard from Canadians. Obviously I'm not talking about a detailed report, but surely there must be some areas on which we could find consensus. I'm thinking, for example, of the issue of direct-to-consumer advertising, where we heard overwhelming evidence from many different perspectives on that issue.
I'm going to suggest we could at least accomplish that and identify it. I would ask our researchers to put their heads to the grindstone and identify three or four key issues that we heard from Canadians as we travelled across the country and to report back to the committee. Then we can have a debate; we can have a discussion. If we have to have votes, we have votes. But I would hope, after having gone through all of these hearings right across the country, we could at least report back to the House with some interim recommendations on our study.
The Chair: I would agree with that.
Mr. Ménard.
[Translation]
Mr. Réal Ménard: I agree with Svend. At our last meeting, we were considering a draft report. I hope we will take up where we left off. Each party can propose some changes, but I hope the draft report we were considering will serve as a starting point. I brought a copy here with me in the hope that we might discuss it this morning. But no matter, we will get to it next Tuesday. All the work we did has to serve some purpose. We invested considerable time and energy in this report and I hope we can reach a consensus, provided the NDP is reasonable.
[English]
The Chair: I agree.
I think you'll notice that's what I said at the beginning, that we might have limited time. We're probably better to clean up what we started as opposed to injecting a whole bunch of new topics, and I'm hoping there will be some consensus around that.
I'm not going to open it up for objections at this point. I will meet with you next Tuesday, having at least talked by phone with the minister, and be able to report that. We'll vote on these motions, and hopefully we might start right into some work on prescription drugs.
Thank you, ladies and gentlemen.
The meeting is now adjourned.