HAFF Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON PROCEDURE AND HOUSE AFFAIRS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA PROCÉDURE ET DES AFFAIRES DE LA CHAMBRE

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Tuesday, October 19, 1999

• 0921

[English]

The Chair (Mr. Derek Lee (Scarborough—Rouge River, Lib.): Order. I see a quorum.

Colleagues, we're about to deal with the adoption of a report creating our standing committees in the House. It should be a fairly quick procedure. You'll see from your agendas that there are two or three other items added on. Hopefully, we can knock them off quickly.

The first item, and the major one, is the constituting of all of our committees, except for the transport committee, which has already been created. Each of you will have the list in front of you. The party whips have collaborated in the creation of this list. If that list is in order, I would take a motion that would move adoption of this as a report of the committee. Will someone move that?

Mr. Chuck Strahl (Fraser Valley, Ref.): I so move.

The Chair: Is there any need for discussion? Mr. Solomon.

Mr. John Solomon (Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, NDP): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I haven't had a chance to look at this in detail, but just a superficial review indicates there's no reference to either a permanent subcommittee or a permanent standing committee on disabilities. In the last Parliament, I'm not sure which committee it was, but there was a subcommittee on disabilities.

I'm not sure if I should raise this under this agenda item, Mr. Chair, or after we approve this general report, but I would put forward a motion to establish either a permanent subcommittee or a permanent standing committee on disabilities, which has been struck in the past, to ensure that those with disabilities have their issues raised on a regular basis.

The Chair: The envelope of human resources development and the status of persons with disabilities certainly exists. Whether or not that committee would want to have a subcommittee could be left with the committee.

Mr. John Solomon: But it's not a subcommittee. It's one committee with human resources development, and I would put forward the argument that we should establish on a permanent basis a separate committee from human resources entitled the Sub-Committee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities.

The Chair: You have made a suggestion. I would prefer to deal with the striking committee report as it is now, and the creation of a subcommittee could be dealt with later.

Mr. Kilger, did you have something you wanted to add on that?

Mr. Bob Kilger (Stormont—Dundas—Charlottenburgh, Lib.): Mr. Chairman, I was just going to mention to our colleague that I think through negotiations the House leaders of all parties arrived at the structure of the permanent committees we had in the first session and at the beginning of this Parliament for the second session. So I think there's already an agreement. Also, if in its wisdom the human resources committee decides to do something of that nature on its own in striking a subcommittee of the permanent committee, I think that should be left to the human resources committee.

Mr. John Solomon: If I may just add, Mr. Chair, to Mr. Kilger, the NDP House leader put forward the suggestion with the other House leaders, and as I understand it, there was supposed to be a comeback from the Liberal House leader with regard to this issue. I'm not sure if that happened, but in discussions this morning with Bill Blaikie, our House leader, he asked me to raise this on behalf of our caucus. I know that a number of people on the human resources committee would support this. I don't know what the vote is. But if we can't establish one this morning, I would ask the committee to consider receiving representation from the human resources committee in the future, if they make a recommendation to strike such a committee. I think we should keep that open, if that's okay.

• 0925

The Chair: What I see is that there may be a need to deal with this later at this committee or among the House leaders or in some fashion that would create either a permanent subcommittee or a separate committee for persons with disabilities. We're quite capable of taking that up at a slightly later time. This wouldn't be the time right now, as I speak, to discuss the merits of that. I'd prefer to close out the striking report we have here and to defer that to discussion among the House leaders and the whips, if that's okay. Thank you for raising it.

May I put the motion, then, to adopt the striking committee report of the list of committees as is before members.

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: It is unanimous. Thank you. So that's disposed of.

Moving on to other business, we had deferred the creation of a private members' business subcommittee, and I'd like to do that now. I believe each of the parties knows who will be sitting on that committee. There is a motion in front of you, if someone would move that.

Mr. John Richardson (Perth—Middlesex, Lib.): I so move.

The Chair: It is moved that subject to adoption by the House of the list of associate members to the committee, the membership of the Sub-Committee on Private Members' Business be as follows. I'm just going to circle around the table here. I'll go to the Liberal Party. Mr. Kilger, do you have the names of the—

Mr. Bob Kilger: They are Mr. Larry McCormick and Mr. Joe Jordan.

The Chair: Thank you. I'll now turn to the Reform Party.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Deborah Grey.

The Chair: The Bloc.

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron (Verchères—Les-Patriotes, BQ): Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral.

The Chair: The NDP.

Mr. John Solomon: Yes. What would you like? I just got my agenda.

The Chair: The Progressive Conservative Party.

Mr. André Harvey (Chicoutimi, PC): André Harvey.

Mr. John Solomon: This is the Sub-Committee on Private Members' Business.

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. John Solomon: Bill Blaikie.

The Chair: I believe that constitutes a full roster. Are there any questions on that? Then I'll put that to a vote.

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: That's unanimous. Thank you.

I think I omitted to read out the portion of the motion that mandated that particular subcommittee. If there are no objections, we will read that vote as including the wording in the motion as it appears on your agenda paper. Is that agreed?

Some hon. members: Agreed.

The Chair: That mandate is identical to the previous mandates of that subcommittee.

Although it has been mentioned, I think it is the custom of the committee to actually appoint the chair of the subcommittee. Mr. Kilger has indicated that Mr. McCormick would be the government's choice. I get the feeling I'm going to have to pass this again.

Mr. Randy White (Langley—Abbotsford, Ref.): Do we have to vote on this?

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: It was carried unanimously.

The next item of business relates to a request by a number of members to get the fisheries committee up and running and the finance committee up and running a day or so earlier than would otherwise be possible. So I am putting to you the suggestion that at routine proceedings today I or someone else would move—

• 0930

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: I have a question, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

The Chair: I would move that the 48-hour rule be waived or that either of those committees could commence their organization tomorrow, Wednesday, with the consent of all members of the House. I would move that in routine proceedings this morning.

Monsieur Bergeron.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: Mr. Chairman, I wasn't informed that some wanted to get the committee up and running more quickly. I'm prepared to agree to that for the Fisheries Committee, but not for the Finance Committee.

[English]

The Chair: Okay. Then I would do that for the fisheries committee, and I would move a motion that would allow the fisheries committee to organize itself tomorrow, Wednesday. Is that agreed?

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: I suppose we have to spread the consent request around a little bit, so I'll try to make sure everybody.... Can each of the parties make sure that's covered off, that everyone is agreed? So this is the fisheries committee only.

Some hon. members: Agreed.

The Chair: Okay. Thank you.

Now, the last item on the agenda relates to agenda and procedure. Because we've been able to move through this fairly quickly this morning, I thought we could address in the agenda and procedure mode how we would organize for witnesses for the Elections Act, Bill C-2, which would be referred to us within the next few days. We know it's coming down the pipeline. We know it has only three hours of debate in the House because it's coming to the committee before second reading. So that is imminent. Would it be the will of committee members to design something right now in terms of witnesses, or would you prefer to have a separate meeting on Thursday to deal specifically with that?

Monsieur Bergeron.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: Mr. Chairman, I propose that the Sub-committee on Agenda and Procedure meet first, as is customary, in order to do some preliminary work, following which the whole committee could be convened.

[English]

The Chair: Okay. Is there any other comment on that? Mr. Knutson.

Mr. Gar Knutson (Elgin—Middlesex—London, Lib.): I'm just wondering whether it makes sense to agree that at the first meeting we should have the minister and some official to brief us on the act. I think some people have been briefed and some people haven't. Perhaps we could empower the chair to call a meeting with those two witnesses in place and then leave the rest of the witness list to the recommendation of the steering committee.

The Chair: The suggestion is that we at least now agree that the first meeting with witnesses we would have on Bill C-2 would involve the minister, followed by departmental officials in some form of briefing. Whether it's macro or micro, I'm not sure. Would that be agreeable, that we could at least cover off the first meeting, and the agenda and procedure subcommittee can deal with the rest? I would target this Thursday as the normal meeting time, but I can't confirm that yet.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Which, the meeting with the minister or the—

The Chair: No, the agenda and procedure subcommittee would meet this Thursday at the normal meeting time. Is that tentatively agreed to, subject to all the other vagaries that can confront us?

Mr. Knutson.

Mr. Gar Knutson: On another point, I was just wondering if in the Thursday meeting the steering committee could also deal with when we will meet and get some agreement on whether it's two or three times a week. So you could lay out some kind of rough schedule, because we're doing this act on top of our normal work.

The Chair: I suppose Mr. Knutson is asking us to recognize that we may have to alter the two-meeting-per-week format that this committee, as I understand it, has usually had.

Mr. Randy White: Why would we do that?

The Chair: Two meetings a week, if it's an hour per meeting, would seem a little bit.... I'll leave it up to the members. It just might be a little bit thin on time in terms of dealing with a piece of legislation. But we can take this up at the subcommittee.

There are a number of members who want to speak to this. Mr. Kilger.

• 0935

Mr. Bob Kilger: If a considerable number of people are affected in their daily responsibilities in the House leadership of the respective parties, I think we should at least try to work within the framework of the twice-a-week meetings. If they have to be extended a little bit, let's look at that. Certainly, we're cognizant of the issue raised by Mr. Knutson in terms of if the workload requires it, I think we'll do the appropriate thing. But certainly at this stage I think we should stick with the agenda we normally have.

The Chair: Mr. Strahl.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Briefly, Mr. Chairman, in the last committee, once we got our teeth into something, such as a bill or whatever, we did try to put together something of a long-term calendar so that we had some idea, as per Mr. Knutson's suggestion, of what was coming up for not just this week but for weeks to come. So I think if we lay it out that way, it's best for all concerned.

The Chair: Sure. We'll try to be prepared for Thursday, if that is indeed when we meet.

Ms. Catterall.

Ms. Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West—Nepean, Lib.): In order that the steering committee can proceed as quickly as possible on Thursday, I just wonder if we could have our committee researcher prepare a list of possible witnesses that we can deal with, rather than us just trying to brainstorm as we sit around the table. It wasn't clear if we had agreed that we would begin next Tuesday hearing from the minister and officials from Elections Canada, or are we going to wait until the steering committee has completed its work?

The Chair: I think there's a sense that we wait until the steering committee meets. We've decided what the first meeting will be. We just haven't decided when the first meeting will be, but it's pretty obvious that we have a meeting slot next Tuesday.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Not to belabour the point, but the bill hasn't yet been given to us, and the critic we have working on it has sent out letters and so on to see what kind of interest there is out there in the big world for appearing as witnesses and so on. We don't have our witness list back yet. I hope to have that within a week, but I don't think we'll have it by Thursday.

The Chair: I should also say that the clerk and the researcher of this committee haven't been sitting idly by waiting for something to happen. They of course have scoped out a possible witness list, and your chair has even gone so far as to start drafting a letter to possible witnesses. This will be a great surprise. I can see Mr. Strahl is quite surprised by this. Anyway, we've done some tentative work on this.

If that's okay, we'll move to adjourn.

Yes, Mr. Strahl.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: I have a point of order. Just before we adjourn, I think all of us know that our clerk who was with us for much of the last session is back with us, but she's going to another committee. I'm not sure how these things are arranged. Of course, all the clerks serve us very well, but we are going to miss you. We appreciated your work with our committee over the last year or two and we wish you well in your new committee assignment.

Some hon. members: Hear, hear!

The Clerk of the Committee: Thank you very much.

The Chair: Mr. Strahl was too cheap to buy you a watch. Thank you, Ms. Carrière.

We're adjourned.