PRHA 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]

Thursday, November 27, 1997

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[English]

The Chairman (Mr. Peter Adams (Peterborough, Lib.)): Colleagues, our main business is the committee's mandate under Standing Order 108.(1)(a)(iii) as it relates to the taking of divisions by electronic means. Our witnesses today are Robert Marleau, who is clerk of the House, and Louis Bard, who is the chief information officer and executive director of information systems.

With respect to our guests, I might make a couple of remarks at the beginning. I try to do this each time because I know we all have busy schedules.

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My present thought for Tuesday, which would be our next meeting, is that we use it as a sort of clean-up and catch-up day. In particular, there may well be follow-up to today's meeting on electronic voting. There is the follow-up that I tried to introduce the last time about how we're going to deal with matters raised by the chief elections officer when he was here. I think that deserves time. Then there's the matter of the regulations for joint committees. I think you've all seen the material by now, but you need time to look at it. I suspect that need not take a great deal of time, but it's something we should discuss as a committee.

On the same sort of tone, it's been suggested to me that the briefing on the business of supply, which we have scheduled for next Thursday, should be postponed. Again this is something we can discuss on Tuesday, but it's my understanding from at least two parties that this might be more appropriate.

Is that okay? Are there any questions about where we're going?

I would then welcome our guests.

Colleagues, we actually have two pieces of documentation today. One is the briefing note that our researcher, Jamie Robertson, has provided for us, and I think everyone has that. The other is the correspondence on electronic voting from Inky Mark, MP, on this same topic. All members have received this. If members do not have it, I'm sure we can produce additional copies at this particular time.

Mr. Marleau, would you care to begin with an opening statement? We're in your hands.

Mr. Robert Marleau (Clerk of the House of Commons): Very briefly, sir, I have a statistics chart, which the clerk can make available, from which I'll speak as part of my opening comments. Then we also have a draft evaluation report, which has been put together by Mr. Bard's team, and I must thank them for the speed with which they put this together. It's still a draft and I'll speak to it towards the end of my comments.

I thought that by way of beginning this meeting I would distribute this chart, which gives you a picture of the numbers of divisions that were taken in the last Parliament. We had to put this together by hand, with several procedural clerks just going through the journals, because as you know, we do not have an automated system for coming up with these figures.

In summary, what it shows is that there were 1,294 divisions in the last Parliament spread over 442 days. That gives you an average of three divisions per day if they were all taken on a sitting day. It also shows that a little more than one-quarter—30% actually—were actual roll calls in the House. Almost 70% of those 1,294 divisions were applied votes. This practice that I developed in the last Parliament and in this Parliament, continuing by unanimous consent to apply the results of one division to the others, accounted for 70% of the total divisions.

Also, confirming what I have said in another meeting, 940 of those divisions were deferred, so deferred divisions are now very much part of our parliamentary culture. That represents 72% of them that were set down as time-date specific. Another telling number is that 55%, more than half of the 1,294 divisions, were related to report stage motions. I'll get back to that in a moment.

The next box shows you a breakdown of how many divisions were stacked at a particular time, showing whenever they were deferred and stacked. In some cases they were applied, in some they were not. There were 16 occasions when there were 10 to 19; 5 occasions when there were 20 to 29; and 9 occasions when there were more than 30.

The last block shows you the distribution of those roll calls and on which days of the week they occurred. As you can see, Tuesdays and Wednesdays were predominant voting days, with Mondays following next.

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What do these charts mean? They can mean a lot of things in terms of how you may want to interpret them, but as a proceduralist, I have to say it means that as part of taking divisions, the committee may want to look at report stage, since more than half of divisions taken on the floor of the House are related to report stage.

Several committees before yours, Mr. Adams, have looked at the issue of report stage. It continues to be a bit of an issue procedurally. There's give and take in terms of what it means for the opposition and what it means for the government and follow-up for committee. That's another debate. But if you introduce electronic voting, you're still looking at 55% of divisions related to one particular stage of a bill. I think you have to look at that as part of the bigger picture.

In terms of an electronic voting system, I accompanied Mr. White and Mr. Boudria to Washington. I'd seen the Washington system before. Mr. Bard and his team also went to Washington, and as well to Missouri to look at the most recent system there.

The report that the clerk will pass around I don't expect you to absorb in this particular meeting, but we'd be happy to come back and discuss any elements of it. It was put together essentially on the basis of your preliminary discussions. It tries to give you a series of potential scenarios, whether you go big panel, small panel, full-name panel or just a motion and a running tally display; whether you decide to go with voting stations located in various parts of the chamber or one for each member's desk or one shared at each member's desk.

All of those options are there. With the costing scenarios, you can remove one and substitute another and come to a different figure. It takes a little analysis, but it's quite simple, actually. I was able to absorb it in about an hour's briefing by Mr. Louis Bard.

Fundamentally, when you get down to what format, and what you want the system to do, there's a range of options offered here. It goes from what we call the “low” and the “high” scenarios. When you get down to costs, if you go to a simple system with a minimum of display panels—that is, essentially the running tally and a statement of what you're voting on—you're looking at a ballpark figure of about $2 million. If you go to the full display of 301 names, plus English and French display panels for a running tally and the question, with touch-screen features—that is, state of the art—you're looking at more than $4 million.

These figures, I'm told by Mr. Bard, extracted from potential suppliers, have been discounted by 30% for the purposes of this presentation. It's estimated in terms of what any particular company might be submitting at this stage that could be discounted by 30%. It could also probably be further discounted by a factor of 15%, maybe even as much as 20%, through the bidding process.

Until we go to that particular level, it's difficult to give you a ballpark figure. The intent of the chart is to allow you to either put in security or take security out of it so that you see what the impact is. The common figure, though, to both systems, whether you go high-end, low-end, or a hybrid in between, we estimate, is that it would cost a little more than $750,000 in infrastructure work for the chamber, whether it's hanging panels, putting lights on desks, running wiring in the existing channels, hooking up to the computer room in the Wellington building—all the extra work that goes beyond the actual system you might select.

I'll leave it there and take questions.

The Chairman: Mr. Bard.

Mr. Louis Bard (Chief Information Officer and Executive Director, Information Systems, House of Commons): To add to Mr. Marleau's comments, we've been a crew of three or four people looking at various display possibilities, looking at the architecture.

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We brought pictures with us. I have pictures I can leave with the committee if you would like to see how some other legislatures have designed their systems.

We've tried to give you a lot of flexibility in the package, which is more like an information package, to allow you to look at all the possibilities for a voting station, all the possibilities for display panels, all the possibilities in terms of types of systems, etc. From that perspective, then you can really use those elements and try, if you like, to assemble a system of your choice, or what will really meet the requirements of the House of Commons.

This information is still preliminary. We've tried to give you real cost scenarios. As you will see, we've tried to give you unit costs. We've used this as a base to develop the scenarios. Therefore, as Mr. Marleau said, there is some room to manoeuvre in terms of dollars for putting a global system together.

We feel that any of these scenarios can be put in place between nine and twelve months from the starting point.

I went into a lot of detail in the report. We've tried to follow the format of Jamie's report. When you read Jamie's report and you read the technical evaluation, they go together. From that perspective, if you have any questions, I would be very pleased to come back to comment or to give you more detailed information on the specific details.

[Translation]

The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Bard. May be you could pass the pictures around.

[English]

I will ask colleagues. We have members here who are not members of the committee. We have Mr. Fontana and Mr. Blaikie. I have Mr. Blaikie first. As long as John Solomon realizes this—John is the member—I'm quite pleased to recognize Bill Blaikie. Then I have Mac Harb, Randy White and Carolyn Parrish. Mr. Blaikie.

Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg—Transcona, NDP): The reason I'm here, Mr. Chairman, is just that I was interested in this issue and wanted just to make a few comments, which may or may not be helpful.

I'm not sure of exactly at what stage this process is. Obviously the committee will be able to recommend certain things, but I presume the decision as to whether or not to go ahead with electronic voting will be taken either by the government or by the House leaders. I wanted some clarity on the process. But I also wanted to say, as someone who was in on one of the earlier recommendations for electronic voting that came out of the McGrath committee, the special committee on reform of the House of Commons, which recommended electronic voting in 1985, that I think the need for electronic voting is a lot less than the need that was perceived in 1985.

At that time we did not have the procedure that we now have whereby the whips get up and say the Liberals will vote yes on this motion; Reform, no; etc. I suppose it was a possibility then, but nobody knew it was a possibility. It hadn't been thought up yet.

We were also engaged in a sort of parliamentary culture in which we spent hours and hours and hours voting. For people who think that we may spend a lot of time voting now, it's just minuscule compared to the amount of time that was spent in repeated standing votes over and over and over again in some of those Parliaments of the 1980s.

Just for the record, I guess, I wanted to enter my own reservation that I think we may be going to an awful lot of trouble and an awful lot of expense for very little return, particularly in view of the fact that unless we change the way we do report stage—and perhaps this is what Mr. Marleau had in mind—we are still going to be doing an awful lot of voting and we're still going to have to have time for each particular vote.

Even if the time for each particular vote is reduced by electronic voting, if we continue to have evenings, as we sometimes have, where we have 40, 50—I've seen 90, 110—votes at report stage on major pieces of legislation, electronic voting isn't going to be worth the money you will spend on it when it comes to those kinds of events.

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In respect of the other events where there isn't that magnitude or that number of votes, we have already devised a system that really dispatches it rather quickly, at least to my satisfaction.

As someone who was in on it from the beginning, and part of that earlier recommendation in the 1980s, I just wanted the committee to know that I have very strong doubts as to the wisdom or the worthwhileness, if you like, of proceeding at this time with electronic voting.

The Chairman: It's not my business to do so, but I would again draw your attention to Inky Mark's letter—the part at least to the point that Bill Blaikie has just made. I wonder if the clerk would care to comment on the point about the process. It seems to me that we could make a report to the House of Commons, but I wonder if the clerk could comment on that.

Mr. Robert Marleau: There was, as Mr. Blaikie said, in 1985 a report from the special committee on reform made to the House, which was not concurred in as such. There were several other reports that were filed with the Board of Internal Economy at the time because of the funding issue on this. It goes back really to 1982.

The board looked at it in 1985, 1986 and 1987, and decided not to proceed with it. Ultimately I would assume as a minimum you would need a resolution of the House, whether it comes through a negotiating agreement among the parties or a committee report that's concurred in. Fundamental changes to the Standing Orders would have to be written as well. It has to be a House decision. It can't be just board; it can't just be committee; it can't be just party consensus.

The Chairman: Hypothetically, would we then communicate with the Board of Internal Economy at that point, or is it automatic once such a thing happens?

Mr. Robert Marleau: I would assume that once the resolution gave a direction to the board on a process and format of the electronic voting in terms of the technological requirements, the board would proceed to call for requests for proposals, and bids would be submitted. Ultimately the board would have to decide on the amount of money, and put it in the estimates.

The Chairman: I have Mac Harb, Randy White, Carolyn Parrish and Chuck Strahl. Mac Harb.

Mr. Mac Harb (Ottawa Centre, Lib.): Thank you very much, Mr. Marleau and Mr. Bard, for your presentation.

It strikes me that if we decide to move ahead with it we will need a three-step approach. The first step is for you to take this information and have somebody look at it and find out if a system can be devised in a way whereby, through simplification of the report stage, they can devise a system that not only meets our requirements and saves us time now, but exceeds that, so that economically it would be viable for us. It strikes me that as the first step somebody would have to do some sort of economic assessment of it and find out what the requirements are from the administration end in order to meet what it is we are aspiring to.

The second step is, I suppose, for us to go out and say “Who can do it? These are the kinds of things we are interested in and that we want.” Once that was done, and five or six or ten groups said they can do it, I suppose the third step would be for us to select. Is that what you have in mind? Are those the kinds of things you are thinking of now?

Mr. Robert Marleau: I think we were trying to be a little more forthcoming in providing the committee with the buffet of options that's available in the electronic voting world, if I can put it that way, and that the committee might focus on what the components are, and that by giving you a rough estimate of the cost of those components the request for proposals would be quite specific. I think if you go with too broad a statement on a request for proposals you're going to get everything ranging from dinner bells to the full Corel Centre display board.

Mr. Mac Harb: Yes. It strikes me that whoever did it in the States...that is phenomenal. I had a chance myself to see the system that is installed in Lebanon, and frankly it's absolutely outstanding. I was told also that the system that's installed in the U.S. in I think it's over 44 states now.... Who installed those systems? Can we somehow get hold of the people who did that and ask what they can do for us?

Mr. Robert Marleau: We did, actually. Monsieur Bard, when he went to Washington, did meet with a major supplier called Daktronics. There's another major U.S. supplier.

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That's not to say there are no Canadian suppliers in this. The RFPs would certainly show there is Canadian interest. Roll Call International is the other large firm that has done a lot of the U.S. assemblies.

You're now looking at a different world from the one the committee did in 1985. The technology on this has really advanced. You're really looking at component building as compared with buying what used to be, when the committee looked at it in 1985, a system that would be specifically designed for a particular legislature and built from scratch. A lot of componentry is readily available. To some degree, if you really wanted to, you could even break down the RFP and ask for supply of various components from various companies.

The Chairman: Mr. White.

Mr. Randy White (Langley—Abbotsford, Ref.): Mr. Marleau, I'm thinking back to Tuesday night in the House, when we had—

An hon. member: We had 13 votes.

Mr. Randy White: There were applied votes. Could you tell me approximately how much time that took and how much time it would take to do the same thing under an electronic voting system?

Mr. Robert Marleau: I have the figures here. I don't know why someone on my staff anticipated the question, but I have exactly the figures here for you in terms that apply to that.

Mr. Randy White: I'm easily readable.

Mr. Robert Marleau: I suppose it's just the fact that it occurred this week.

For Tuesday, November 25, 17 divisions were scheduled at 6 p.m. We started a little later than normal because of a Speaker's ruling. Normally the bells would have rung at 5.15 p.m. There is a 15-minute bell.

We started voting at 6.06 p.m. and it was over at 6.30. Votes were taken on 15 motions relating to the main estimates. The supply bill was done in committee of the whole, plus second reading and third reading. Five applications of results were applied to motions and ten direct applications to results of unnumbered divisions by Speaker's ruling.

So 17 divisions were taken in about 30 minutes, at an average of one minute and 45 seconds per division. One roll call took about 5 minutes and it took about 25 minutes to finish the rest of the divisions. If you take out the 5 minutes for the roll call, the time spent on each of the other divisions for the whips to apply averages out to 94 seconds per division.

That means the application of votes is extremely efficient in terms of timing. I think I can make that comment. The only problem I think you have with the application of votes at this time is that it does require unanimous consent. As you well know, from time to time that consent does break down. It need not break down amongst the parties. We do also have an independent in the House, and when in the House he has to grant his consent.

There would be ways of looking at incorporating in the rules a formula for it to be done without its necessarily being unanimous and without its necessarily being strictly dictated by the government. Off the top of one's head, if you think of time allocation, time allocation for stages of a bill is based on three formulas. When all parties are agreed—there have been consultations and all parties agree—you can do all stages in one day. You can do just about anything. When all parties are agreed you can just vote on it and have no debate.

The next is when a majority of the parties are agreed in the House, you can have a formula, but you must go through a process of one stage per day.

Then of course there's the formula of where the government declares there has been consultation, there has been no agreement, and they require prior notice. Again, they must do a stage per day.

You could use a similar formula, where agreement would be sought amongst the parties to try to write up standing orders that would get away from the unanimous consent requirement. That really is something the committee would have to consider.

Mr. Randy White: And the other half of the question? It took 24 minutes Tuesday night. How long would it have taken—

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Mr. Robert Marleau: It took a total of 30 minutes. One could assume that if you vote during bells—I think that if I look at the Boudria-White testimony of the previous meeting, you were considering voting during bells—you could probably do this in 15 minutes to 20 minutes, depending on the time for display, the time you want to allow between the two votes.

The first vote would take longer, let's say five or six minutes, to allow members to assemble and vote. If you have stacked votes, then it depends how much time you would allow for members to be seized of the next question, cast their vote and be seized again for the next question. If you go to a minute, you're saving about 30 seconds per vote.

Mr. Randy White: Is there a cost-recovery analysis? I see cost analysis.

Mr. Robert Marleau: No. We didn't do a cost-recovery analysis, because at this stage I would assume we would do one as the committee focuses on a particular system and cost. For cost recovery we would have to put a value on members' time. We could take the salary and break it down in terms of per minute, if you want it, although I don't think that's a true value of members' costs, particularly the debate on members' salaries these days.

An hon. member: I agree.

Mr. Robert Marleau: I'm sorry, I'm getting away from the subject, Mr. Chairman.

The other issue is how much we would also recover. There could be considerable cost recovery in staff time, because this would be an entire link through the software programs with the journals, so that reproduction of the actual votes in the journals of the House would have some cost saving. If it does speed up the system, over a period of time you're saving time in the House. Most of these votes are now going beyond the ordinary hour of adjournment, so we're looking at costs for overtime in certain areas of activity, but it's premature and too early for us to put a figure on it.

Mr. Randy White: My final question, Mr. Chairman.

On the high-low cost estimates here, just so I'm reading it right, the infrastructure costs at $750,000, but the low grand total cost, you're suggesting, is $2.5 million, which is quite a bit higher than I thought it would be. I'd like you to explain that. Also, I wonder if $2.5 million is quite a bit more expensive than changing the Standing Orders as to how we apply votes.

Mr. Robert Marleau: Changing the Standing Orders is a little bit of overtime for the Clerk of the House to get it back to you. I think that would be the cheapest option.

I queried Mr. Bard on the infrastructure costs being the same for the low-end unit and the high-end unit, and it likely would be a little less on the low-end unit. But if you go to low-end unit, we would probably have to put lights on the desks and therefore they would have to be drilled and there's a little more...and lights bought and maybe designed.

As for the cabling, there is some cabling in the floor, but depending on how sophisticated the system is devised, it may require recabling. Electrical supply is a big issue in the Centre Block, as you know. Even adding the extra PCs in the opposition lobby, we had some major electrical challenges in trying to feed those machines and those printers. So depending on the electrical demand, there are costs there that Mr. Bard feels uncomfortable not reflecting at this juncture. Then the heritage aspect might be a little less in the low-end cost, because you're not dealing with hanging panels in the archways or against the galleries. But he felt better going with the flat sort of infrastructure support; there might be some savings there.

It is a little bit higher than even you and I discussed on the airplane, but I have to tell you I am not surprised. If anything, at $2 million it's about what it was five or six years ago, except it's far more sophisticated. While the technology may not have gone down in total costs for introduction into the chamber, the technology has advanced considerably in terms of what it can do, particularly from a software point of view.

Mr. Randy White: Thank you.

The Chairman: Mrs. Carolyn Parrish, then Chuck Strahl.

Ms Carolyn Parrish (Mississauga Centre, Lib.): Mr. Chairman, I would like you to indulge me for a second and let me make a few comments, because I feel a very strange obligation here today.

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I represent 100 members of the House, as Ontario caucus chair, and I also represent myself. On my own merit, I'm very sad to see all the examples that came around the table were American chambers. I bemoan the Americanization of Canadian politics on every level, and I feel that's a really unfortunate set of examples I saw.

I personally experienced an electronic voting system in Sweden that was very classy. Each table had its own voting station. Each light went on in the panel, as Mr. Boudria described the other day, and you couldn't see the panel unless the lights were on. It had one of those false fronts. There was a number assigned to the person and to the desk. The numbers were up there and it was very clear who was voting which way. It was a classy system and a much gentler system than any of these American abominations I've seen.

As far as Mr. Marleau's comments on members' time, I feel I'm paid so much a minute just to breathe. Whether I'm here voting, in my riding, or sleeping, I'm paid so much a minute. So I don't think members' time is a cost factor.

I think the concept of application of votes that's been developed over the last four years is excellent and it's saving a lot of money and a lot of time. I agree with Mr. Blaikie, and I'm wondering to myself how often I'm agreeing with Mr. Blaikie.

On the $750,000 for the cheap, stripped-down version as opposed to $2.5 million to do it right, I would rather spend $2.5 million and do it right.

I would rather address all the concerns of the MPs. That's my personal bias. I believe in the solemnity of being in the House voting. I believe in the tradition and the ceremony that surround it. I think it's fabulous, but that's my personal opinion. I find this whole movement to the Americanization of our system lousy.

I will now speak on behalf of the Ontario caucus. There were a lot of concerns raised this week. I'm not going to divulge exactly what went on in caucus, but I can give you a list of concerns.

First, they want it to be transferable to the West Block and back without a huge cost, because we are moving to the West Block and coming back. There is a very serious concern about security and the vote being able to be identified fairly instantly with the person who's voting. It's a very long tradition in our House that we're accountable for our votes, and that was a very serious concern.

No one, except for one member, was even the least bit interested in off-site voting—in other words, voting from your office or your riding. They were very concerned about the aesthetics of the screen and they wanted individual voting stations at the desks.

There is one question Mr. Marleau may be able to answer for me. Several members brought up the concern that they would like an override of the system. In other words, if you're having a vote on capital punishment, they want an override to be in place so you can forget the buttons, lights, excitement and the screen and stand up and be counted when there is a very serious vote. Is there a way of bringing that into play or a way of changing the rules of the House? Just as you now need unanimous consent to dispense, if you can get a reasonable number of people requesting a stand-up vote, is there a way to override that voting system?

Mr. Robert Marleau: On your last question, many of the legislatures that have electronic voting, even outside the U.S., provide from time to time for stand-up roll call votes for ceremonious, important, specific votes. That can be built into the Standing Orders.

In terms of the override, right now it requires five members rising in their seats to cause the taking of a vote. You could have a formula, I suppose. If 25, 30, 35 or whatever is agreed upon among the parties or the whips—the kind of formula I talked about earlier—there could be a roll call, a vote. That's easily done, I think. It can be provided in the Standing Orders.

By way of comment on the issues you raised out of the Ontario caucus, one of the concerns in the 1995 report and the Boudria-White testimony of last week is the aesthetics of the chamber and the heritage value of it. So the design would have to be very much in keeping with that. That is part of the proposal here in terms of the cost of it. If you went to simply electro-mechanical coloured lights, you could easily put on a neon show for a lot less money than say quality LED displays.

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Finally, there is one from Lebanon in here that Mr. Harb had particularly commented on, but I have to tell you that it's also made by an American company, Daktronics. Either Daktronics or another firm, Roll Call International, pretty well—I don't want to say they've cornered the market here—produces many of the systems around the world.

I've not seen the Swedish Parliament, but I've seen one in the Indian Parliament, where it is used sparingly, if I can put it that way. Very few Commonwealth or confidence-type chambers have electronic voting, which is why there isn't a whole lot of selection here in terms of other systems. But they're basically the same. They can be nice like Sweden's, or disappear like the one in Washington—behind the tapestry—when they're off. Those are design features that are doable against the amount of money you have.

Ms Carolyn Parrish: I would like to make one more comment, Mr. Chairman. There wasn't an overwhelming negative reaction in Ontario, but there was a great deal of concern expressed. It was something I would suggest to this committee so that we proceed very slowly and with great caution.

If you plunge into this very quickly, you're going to have a lot of people very upset. A very simple comment I got from a lot of the members was that they'd rather have Pentiums in their offices and upgrade their offices rather than having a gadget in the chamber for voting. Whereas I cannot say to you definitively that Ontario is against this—it's not—it was a very mixed bag at the Ontario caucus. You were there, and I think Marlene and a few others were as well.

If you're going to make this a success, it has to be proceeded with very slowly. It has to be done very cautiously. The concerns of the members have to be all addressed before you plunge into this.

The Chairman: I would like to comment here. I think it's extremely important—and we've heard from members of caucus that this be conveyed to all the caucuses—that all members be involved and that they have the level of information that we have.

Chuck Strahl, Bob Kilger, John Solomon and Marlene Catterall.

Mr. Chuck Strahl (Fraser Valley, Ref.): Thanks, Mr. Marleau, for your report and for preparing all the detailed data here. I'm impressed with that alone. It's more electronic work than I've done in a year.

The cost is surprising. The cost is more than what we were kicking around earlier, so that's the first focus of attention. It'll probably be costly to move and they'll have to move it back. By then, of course, there may be new technology. I don't know. Anyway, there are quite a few costs involved and they're higher than what we had originally thought, but I guess we can deal with that.

I agree with Randy that I'd like to see a cost-benefit analysis on it, or some idea of whether or not this will really save us money. Money is only one of the considerations here, but it is a consideration that I think it would be useful to have.

There are a couple of things I'm interested in particularly. Maybe we've all done this arithmetic on the first potentially lengthy vote the other night. We did the same kind of thing as you did, Bob, and as you say, once you get down under two minutes per vote, I do question whether it can be possibly faster than that. I question that because, as you say, you wonder how much time you have to give members to be seized of the next issue. It was relatively easy last night because the votes were very close to the same on all of them. All the parties took the similar position, and we applied them all. It was very good as far as applying votes is concerned.

But if you get into report stage amendments, for example, where a party will take a position and say that if amendment one passes, it will vote yes for amendment two, but if one passes it's no for two, and if two passes it's yes for four, and all of that, I think we may be expecting quite a bit if we leave sixty seconds between votes while expecting everyone to have that figured out. I really wonder, because you'll publish the results and everyone will start down the process of asking what that means now. Often, those report stage amendments are deleting lines 17 to 25, for example. Everyone will be saying okay, let me see now, 17 to 25, get out my book, see if that....

So I guess I question whether it would be quicker. I think you made mention of that. I'm not sure it would be.

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I'm interested in whether you have any more specifics on how we could change that report stage amendment process in general. I'm not sure how you do that. If we could, and if you have an idea that would make it simpler or quicker, perhaps that would make the whole thing more possible and more plausible. But I am questioning that, because we had 17 votes the other night in pretty short order.

We can have the first vote electronically and then apply the votes. We can have everyone sit in their seats until the end of the application of votes. I don't know if we could do it more quickly. If quickness is the only consideration.... There are other things, and that's why your idea of how it's quicker for journals, it's quicker for Hansard, it's quicker for.... Maybe there are enough other considerations, but I think cost-benefit analysis may be key to this.

The Chairman: Mr. Marleau.

Mr. Robert Marleau: There are two things on the cost. It really boils down to display. Two large panels, let's say, in keeping with the chamber, display readable names of 301 members. You're talking about $600,000 per panel. And for two—one English, one French—running tallies with the question summary on them, you're talking $400,000 each. So right there is where the money is, in essence.

If you go to a system with no display, the Speaker rises in the House and reads the question as he does now, members push a button and green lights and red lights go on. A small display at the table gives me the results to announce to the House. In other words, it's doing electronically what takes five minutes. If you go to that system, you could come in considerably under $2 million, but would it be worth it? That's the question you would have to evaluate. With respect to the costing, you're really talking about the cost of displaying the vote.

In terms of whether it could be quicker, yes, it could. The issue as I outlined it in my opening remarks is that when 55% of the votes are on report stage motions, that's the crux, I think, of the issue. Some of the voting pattern is complex enough, and as you well know, particularly to apply the results now you discuss it several hours ahead of time among the whips to make sure that—depending on the results on one and on the other—they are followed through carefully. I assure you that we table officers are quite often tracking it very closely, because the consequences there are serious. That's not to say that we're infallible in any way, but for the chair to do it in an orderly fashion, it has to be tracked very carefully.

So yes, it can be difficult for a member, particularly if he arrives later in the process in a report stage to the chamber, to really say, “Where are we and what am I voting on?” There are issues related to report stage that I think have to be addressed fundamentally against the system you design and how much time you allow.

In regard to amendments for report stage, report stage was brought into the House of Commons in 1968 and was inspired by the British process of report stage. It's been reviewed many times since. It was not intended at the time to be an entire review of the bill. It was intended to be a review of the committee stage, and if the House didn't like what the committee had done to the bill, then the opportunity to reinstate or to do a little more than what the committee did was there. But it really has become—and I don't say this in a negative way, because it's been like that since 1968, and it almost started from the day after—another stage, which has gone far beyond the committee amendments.

It was tightened up a little bit in the 1980s when the Speaker was given direction from the procedure committee to select a little more tightly, in that amendments that were defeated in committee ought not to be selected again at report stage. All that caused was members withholding their amendments in committee and saving them for report stage.

Report stage is an important part of the process. It can't be eliminated, and I'm not advocating that in any way whatsoever, but there are formulas in other countries. In Great Britain the Speaker selects severely. It's not unusual to have a maximum of one or two motions per political party—three at the outside—at report stage in Great Britain, because essentially the Speaker says “Why didn't you do this in committee?”

And events occur. Ministers make commitments at committee to make changes to legislation and will do so at report stage in Great Britain and sometimes here. There just isn't the time to do it in committee and they commit to do it at report stage. Or they'll commit to accepting an amendment from the opposition at report stage, but they need time to do the analysis or the writing, and there will be negotiations on the text.

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Mr. Chuck Strahl: Those are rare occasions.

Mr. Robert Marleau: They're rare here in our culture, but they're not rare in Great Britain. Why are they not rare in Great Britain? Because the Speaker will also deny the government, if it's not a commitment at report stage, to make an amendment. He will not select a government amendment just because drafters in the justice department thought of a good idea late in the process.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: There are two interesting discussions here. One is the voting electronically. We all tend to want to do that, to yank us into the 20th century, if not the 21st century. I think there is another committee that is going to deal with Standing Orders suggestions.

To me that's the more important issue here really, because unless we decide on this, I'm not sure that electronic voting is going to have the support of the members, because of this problem of someone comes in two minutes late and they're asking where are we and what's going on, because of the number of amendments that get in on report stage especially. So I think that's going to be difficult.

They can usually rely on having done the work ahead of time. They usually rely on the whips to apply that vote, because they at least say somebody is keeping tab of this, the table officers and the whips. So I really think that's the important issue. I think that needs to be decided before we decide on electronic voting. That's my feeling.

The second thing is that, from an opposition whip's point of view, our tendency in the last Parliament, and already in this one, is to work together to make the voting as painless as possible. That is a very good process in itself, because we have worked together as whips to defer the vote and to say if you don't mind, if it's the same to you or if it's not a problem, let's defer it again until Tuesday, let's get them all on one day, what do you think? It gives an opposition whip an opportunity to say to the government whip, that's sounds good, but we have to have a few more speakers, and he says that's fine, let me see what I can arrange.

If you take that out of our parliamentary system, I have a bit of a concern that it will be a no-holds-barred, let everybody do whatever they do right in their own mind, and what now is a workable system of saying okay, as long as you don't pull any shenanigans, and Bob in turn can say to me, as long as you don't dump ten extra speakers on us. And back and forth it goes, and Stéphane says this is important to me—

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron (Verchères, BQ): We usually don't mind.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Anyway, my concern about electronic voting is people will see that as a panacea for all the voting issues, and instead of being a point of negotiation and a small bit of influence opposition whips can have on the process, it's taken away from us, and then the government no longer has to negotiate. They just say choose my way or the highway; press the red button if you don't like it. Right now, we have a better system than that, and I think all of us have worked well with the government in order to keep the voting to a minimum. I'm a little nervous that this electronic thing will take a lot of this out and it will become you versus us even more than it is, and the voting will become even less of a chance to work together. I just throw that out.

The Chairman: Can we take that as a comment, and Mr. Marleau perhaps can pick up on it later on.

Bob Kilger, John Solomon, Marlene Catterall.

[Translation]

Mr. Bob Kilger (Stormont—Dundas, Lib.): Mr. Marleau, Mr. Strahl said he was a little nervous. Personally, this makes me really nervous. It seems that we also agree about the discussions and the negotiations between the whips.

I must say, frankly, that there is indeed a lot of cooperation between the whips and the House leaders in this 36th Parliament; you can see the advantages of having the work planned a bit more in advance and of the cooperation, in terms of deferring the votes until an evening which suits everybody.

Mr. Strahl has already asked my question, but I would like to make a comment before I come back to it. As Mr. White and others have already said, the cost you mentioned, Mr. Marleau, is already above what we thought it would be. I think I can make that comment. We have, around this table, representatives of all the parties' leaders. We know that, at the Board of Internal Economy, the matter is going to be scrutinized over the next few weeks when the Main Estimates for fiscal year 1997-1998 are considered.

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And when the costs in the members' operating budget, including the allowance and now the electronic voting system, are reviewed on a priority basis, I believe that, with the new figures that were just given to us, the priority of this system will not be very high. However, this will still be discussed at the Board of Internal Economy. I think that the figures you just gave us are very telling.

I want to be a bit more forward-looking. If we take into account the work that is being done and that will continue to be done on the Hill, particularly in the year 2000 when the Centre Block will be renovated, then it might be more appropriate, wiser, in fact to think about putting in an electronic voting system at that time. In any case, it's not only up to me. However, I believe Chuck hit the nail on the head.

[English]

I think Chuck hit the nail on the head, given the figures we have now. We have to balance that against the other priorities. I've enumerated only a few of them.

On the question of unanimous consent, I think it would be in our interest to at least have discussions and negotiations as to what might be more responsible for Parliament. Then the Standing Orders of course—because it's very clear, from the numbers given to us by the clerk, that the report stage is really the issue that we have to address and hopefully resolve to continue to improve the system that's been developed in the last Parliament, going back to Mr. Boudria, Mr. Silye and others.

I just offer that as a comment, because, as I said, Mr. Strahl's question was exactly the one I wanted to present to the clerk. I think it's this committee that will deal with the Standing Orders, and I look forward to engaging those discussions and negotiations to hopefully address and resolve that matter to a great extent.

Thank you.

Mr. John Solomon (Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, NDP): I feel as if we're becoming a one-party system in the House of Commons as a result of this discussion, at least on one issue.

I had questions similar to those that Mac and Chuck had with regard to a cost-benefit analysis—and Randy, as well as Mr. Kilger.

I think we need that to see whether this is going to be financially of benefit to us. I agree with Carolyn Parrish that if this was an opportunity for us to spend money on electronic voting, then we have the same opportunity to provide adequate and satisfactory funding to members' budgets.

I would rather have more money to hire more staff and get into the 20th century with respect to my computer equipment. I was taken aback when Carolyn said—maybe it was just not quoted properly or I didn't pick it up properly—she wanted to upgrade her Pentium. We don't have a Pentium.

Ms Carolyn Parrish: To a Pentium.

Mr. John Solomon: Oh good, because we don't have—

Ms Carolyn Parrish: Be careful.

Mr. John Solomon: I thought that's what you said.

Ms Carolyn Parrish: I have 386s and 486s.

Mr. John Solomon: Exactly, the same as I do.

When I was in business, we had this stuff in my business seven or eight years ago. It's really out of date.

My point is this. I think we have to do a cost-benefit analysis, number one. Number two, if we're going to be looking at this as a serious consideration, we have to make sure, as Bob has indicated, that these costs apply to either both the current House of Commons and the future site or just the future site. We're not sure.

Maybe you could respond to that when I make my other two points.

The other thing I noticed from the pictures of the voting is that all of the screens in these legislatures and parliaments are at the front and all of the seats face the front. It's a wholly different system from the House of Commons, where you're facing each other. A portion of the House will not have access to viewing these screens. That is an observation that I make.

The second observation I make is that I'm not sure how many of those parliaments vote on party lines. I know that in the States they don't. They vote individually, both the legislatures and the representatives in the Senate. So they require more assistance with respect to electronic voting, whereas our House of Commons in most cases will vote along party lines, although individual members vote according to their consciences on some issues.

Are these numbers predicated, Mr. Marleau, on both locations or on just one location? If not, how might that apply in the future?

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Mr. Robert Marleau: I have two comments, sir. First, on the technological point of view, I'd like to make a slight update to your comments. Each member's office already has the equivalent of two Pentiums, machines that have been upgraded to roughly 180 megahertz, and a third 486, older technology, on your desks. The proposal, as was suggested awhile ago, is that the board is considering looking at a third Pentium in members' offices, which is also part of the demands in members' offices.

To get back to the last question, the RFP, or request for proposal, would have to say, at least in terms of the major display panels and the major consoles, that they be easily transportable to the temporary chamber in the West Block. The infrastructure would then be built in as part of the new chamber.

Likely we could get Public Works to absorb most of that. The optic fibre cable is already there under the street, linked to the Wellington Building, where the main server would be located, whether it's Centre Block voting or West Block voting. Therefore, there would be no attendant costs to that.

We estimate that these figures include the requests for proposal that would say, “transportable on such and such a date at minimum cost”.

On the report stage issue, it's not unanimous in the House. I think as you implied in your comments, every member enjoys having the whip apply his vote on his or her behalf. I certainly get representations at the table. The Standing Orders could be structured so that you still provide for members who wish to rise alone, independent of that, to do so. It's not without the realm of imagining a set of standing orders that would allow that as well.

The Chairman: Mr. Marleau, would you care to comment again on the cost recovery aspect? As I heard you, you said it would perhaps be difficult until there was a fairly precise proposal or whatever. Could you comment on that again?

Mr. Robert Marleau: The reason I say it's fairly difficult.... I mean, we could try to do for you a cost recovery analysis on various scenarios, but it varies as to whether you vote within bells, and it varies as to how much time you allow between stacked votes. It varies on whether votes are all deferred and stacked, or if you're still going to allow for what I would call “unscheduled” votes to occur in the House.

If you break it down even in terms of the cost of fuel for the buses moving back and forth when there's a vote on, it's quite extensive. If I'm going to squeeze every cost-recovered dollar out of the system, what you design...but I suppose we could take the high- and low-end ones and try to give you those two in terms of cost recovery.

The Chairman: Colleagues, would that be useful?

We certainly don't want you doing lots and lots of hypothetical scenarios, but would that be useful, to take a low end and a high end and get some sense of cost recovery?

Mr. Robert Marleau: Do you want us also to look at an amortized period? Because the life of this system is part of that cost recovery. I mean, in year one it's not going to pay for itself.

The Chairman: I understand the point.

Mr. Robert Marleau: If I recall the figures from the Washington system, they've had a major renewal of it every ten years, or just about every ten years. If you wanted to go in terms of ten years of the life of the system, or two parliaments, we can try to come up with something along those lines.

The Chairman: Again, colleagues, I'm thinking out loud, but the idea is that we get some sense of cost recovery by taking the high end and the low end, and a ten-year amortization period.

Mr. Louis Bard: I should qualify this, that in terms of cost-benefit analysis there are two key elements. You have the tangible and the intangible. From all my discussions with Canadian firms, U.S. firms and Washington, everybody seems to focus mainly on the intangible. There's the image, the vote speed, but there are also a lot of other benefits in the background in terms of whip assistants being able to put down information, all the recording, the history. There's a lot more to it. It becomes more a question of whether or not we want it.

Truly, the most difficult part is to put a value on the intangibles, what a group like this values, such as having their names displayed or having this be seen by the public, being recognized with the technologies—all of these things.

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As well, in terms of the scenario you have in front of you, even though, as I say, we went to the States to very quickly get a sense of what it is, the component, the unit costs are there to identify all the requirements to put a system together. But the most important thing we've tried to develop is this image of the Canadian House of Commons, not like we've seen in other places, because the voting system is part of the culture of an institution.

We recognize that there's not one system, not one approach and not one person who describes their system in the same manner. We will try, with that package, to reflect the image of our Parliament, of the House of Commons.

The Chairman: I think you've caught the wishes of the committee very well then. On the cost-benefit, my sense is that where there's something that's very complex or intangible, at this stage you would simply note that and we would look at the cost-benefit on that basis.

Marlene Catterall, Mac Harb, André Harvey.

Ms Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West—Nepean, Lib.): I have three main points here, and one I want to spend a bit of time on. The others I think can be dealt with quickly.

When the clerk talked about how long electronic voting on Tuesday night would have taken us, I didn't hear a time saving. In fact, if we look at the system the Americans have, where you've got five minutes between votes for people to understand what the implication of the last vote is before they vote on the next one, to put down their coffee cup to get back to their seats, to get back from the washroom, whatever, if we used five minutes between votes we would be ending up with substantially more time than we spent Tuesday night on the same number of votes. Am I wrong about that?

Mr. Robert Marleau: No, you're quite right.

Ms Marlene Catterall: Secondly, I guess the whole issue—which you outlined very well—is what are the benefits of this. Have we even described what we expect the benefits to be, what needs are going to be met by this, as defined by members of Parliament, as defined by the administration? Have we done that yet?

Mr. Robert Marleau: I think the benefit that I've heard in the evidence of the committee and in the discussion of Mr. Boudria and Mr. White is a time-saving benefit. At least, it is a perceived time-saving benefit by voting within the bell period. That has some costs to it.

On the administrative side, as I alluded to, I think we could save a certain amount. When there are a lot of divisions, like the other night, we might save a considerable amount of time in the journals branch in terms of input and proofreading and getting it right. So that translates into overtime costs.

Ms Marlene Catterall: If I may, those are bits and pieces. I guess where I've seen government fall down substantially and very expensively over the years, when it tried to do information technology systems, is that it doesn't have a decent definition at the beginning of the needs of its users and the people it's supposed to benefit. Have we done that?

Mr. Robert Marleau: We've certainly—

Ms Marlene Catterall: I think we've talked about it ad hoc.

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes. I haven't seen it articulated in terms of a specific objective from the committee or from the—

Ms Marlene Catterall: Plus sized up the downsides.

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes.

Ms Marlene Catterall: The main thing I wanted to talk about, because I really do think we need to be quite future-oriented, was the comment of this report about the opportunity to integrate a system into the corporate network, apply it to other services. I look around this table, here in a country that has double the share of the world market it should have in terms of its size in information technology, yet here we sit surrounded by paper. It seems to me that whether we go ahead with this or not, we should be looking over all of this as part of bringing our work into the 20th century before we reach the 21st century.

There's absolutely no reason most of this information I'm carrying with me couldn't be on a screen right here, built into this desk. I don't even know if we're looking at that for the West Block, in our rebuilding of it, and at least building that capability in.

I would be interested in knowing what you did find out about what other legislatures are doing in terms of integrating their voting and other electronic benefits for members of Parliament.

Mr. Robert Marleau: In terms of other electronic benefits to members of Parliament in an electronic voting system, I know very few that provide other than a quick way of voting and leaving the chamber.

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The touch-screen technology, which is referred to here as the high-end, roughly about $3,500 per unit, if you put one on every member's desk would be totally integrated with our network system now, Intranet. Indeed, you could surf the net from your desk in the House, do your e-mail, send your colleague across the way a message, and we can eliminate the pages. It has that potential if you go to that kind of touch-screen technology that is fully integrated with our network. I know members are asking for more of this technology to get their work done. We're looking at the virtual office rolling out to the constituencies, and this would be an extension of that network.

I daresay that we are one of the most advanced legislatures when it comes to having networked the parliamentary campus, and if we can link up the constituencies, which ought to be done in the next year or so.... We have the pilot going on right now, so that when you are in your constituency office you will be totally transparent; you may as well be sitting in your office on the Hill in terms of accessing documents and transferring files. All of that would be doable in the proposal that's before you, on the PC-based touch-screen technology.

The Chairman: We'll have Mac Harb, André Harvey, and Denis Coderre.

Colleagues, I'm sorry to do this, but if we could—

Mr. Mac Harb: Speed it up.

Mr. Chair, I think it will be very timely now that our administration is going to look at the cost-benefits for this committee, if that's what we want them to do, to approve in principle that pending the outcome of the study, if the study shows that there are cost-benefits, in fact we want to move in that direction. Frankly, I don't like to see us going down the stream with staff time put into it, expenses, and so on, when in fact we have not really decided that's what we want to do.

I wonder whether it would be timely for us. I know at the last meeting Mr. Epp proposed a motion to that effect, and we told him to hold on. I wonder, Mr. Chair, whether it wouldn't be timely now for us to entertain at least a motion in principle to proceed, pending the outcome. If the outcome is positive, then we will proceed; if the outcome is negative, then we'll can it right there and then.

The Chairman: My interpretation is that we do not yet have consensus. I would have thought, particularly given the membership that's here at the moment, that this might be something we would better do on Tuesday. I welcome suggestions on that, if I might.

Let's keep to the list: André Harvey, Denis Coderre, and Marlene Catterall.

[Translation]

Mr. André Harvey (Chicoutimi, PC): At the beginning, when we had our first meeting, we all were under the impression that it was an easy matter for everyone. We now realize that, if you think a little about it, it's not that clear, and judging by the comments made by my colleague who is a member of the Liberal Party— unfortunately, I don't have her name, I'm sorry—you can see that it's a question of tradition versus innovation.

If things are going too fast around us, the House is not necessarily the place where we should be trying to catch up. Some things require that we take our time, that we think about it. It's a tradition which is important to maintain.

There are also the improvements that have already been made in the House. I know that at one time, things were pretty awful, the process of voting in the House was extremely long and on that particular point, things have indeed improved enormously, as Chuck said earlier.

Given that extensive work will be undertaken in the House of Commons—at the last meeting, we even talked about having to move this sophisticated equipment to the West Block—I believe that the minimum we could agree on as a committee, since we don't even agree on the principle, might be that, should a decision be taken in the year 2000, 2004 or 2008, we should assess the infrastructure that would be needed if, one day, all parties decide to go ahead.

Currently, I think we are very far from a decision and as a committee, we have, I believe, no intention to ask for a... It's not even a question of costs-benefits. I think there are deeper ideological issues to look at. There is the fact that you have to be in the House, that you have to rise to vote—the human face of the issue—which still concerns a lot of members, I think. It might not be a bad thing. So we'd better consider the cost of the infrastructure which, in two, five or ten years from now, could be useful when Parliament decides to pursue the idea of having an electronic voting system.

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The system requires that extensive infrastructure work be done and it would be a pity if, in four years from now, when the decision is made to go ahead, we had to break things down, to start the work all over again and to put in more money.

As a first step, I suggest that, before the work is started, the committee get an analysis done to see what it would take and how much it would cost to prepare for the day when we might put in this new voting system.

The Chairman: Thank you, André.

Denis Coderre and Marilyn Catterall.

Mr. Denis Coderre (Bourassa, Lib.): These are my own views, but I mainly concur with what my colleague Harvey said. The real issue is to determine whether this is a priority. Is it a priority to have an electronic voting system? We should discuss the very role of a member of Parliament. Should a Parliament, to be up-to- date, be electronically wired? Does the fact that our constituents see us rise make us more accountable than simply pressing a button to show later on that we were there, that we participated in the vote.

I also agree with my colleague from Ontario when she said that the real issue is to determine whether we want to keep this tradition, this symbolic system or whether we go to an americanized system. As a new member, I sometimes think that, even now, things are going a little too fast. We might be less responsible, we trust our whips. On our side, we have an excellent whip...

Clearly, I think we need to think about the very role of a member of Parliament, about making members more accountable, so that we find ways to do our work better and to consider our votes more carefully. I think we are not necessarily ready for an electronic voting system. In the States, they don't have the same parliamentary system. In fact, American representatives are much more individualistic and they are not subject to the same... you know what I mean. It's not the same milieu, it's not the same environment, it's not the same atmosphere. So I don't think that we should necessarily compare what happens here and what happens in the States.

Finally, I think that, unfortunately, too often, technology, which should be at our service as members of Parliament, plays a role we should play ourselves. The work is being done by the committee, but this issue should be debated in the House and we should ask ourselves what kind of role we want to play in the 21st century. It is not true that, to be up-to-date, you need more computers.

If I can make a comment as a member of Parliament, my priority, before investing in an electronic voting system, would be to give more tools to each member in his or her own constituency, more tools to be fully accountable. We are often portrayed in the media as big spenders, people with too many privileges. So I think that we should take this notion under consideration, since we are too cynical about our role as members of Parliament, very often because Canada is such a big country. We should make sure that we have more tools to represent our constituents as best we can before wondering whether we should press a button to say yes or no and have our opinions automatically compiled.

The Chairman: Thank you, Denis.

[English]

Marlene Catterall, and then I'm going to try to wind it up.

Ms Marlene Catterall: I suggest that we defer this, as you suggested. There doesn't seem to be a consensus, and I think it's fairly significant that the chief whips from two of the opposition parties aren't even here. Above all, voting is the concern of the whips.

I also think some very constructive things have been said about the comparative advantage of our new system of applying votes. I think the House leaders and perhaps the whips together should be given an opportunity to see whether we can't put that on a sounder footing so that it might in fact achieve some of the benefits.

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In any case, I think the clerk has heard some of the issues and questions that members of the committee have, and I'd just suggest that we defer it to next week rather than voting on it in any way, Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman: Colleagues, that is my sense also, as it was at the beginning, but I will still suggest that as a committee we return to it on Tuesday. As I mentioned, there are at least two other items we could deal with that day. I think we actually do need a meeting devoted to discussion on a number of topics, and this would certainly be one.

There is the matter, though, of the cost-benefit. In terms of that, Monsieur Marleau and Monsieur Bard, I would leave it to your judgment. We will be meeting on Tuesday and discussing this again in some way, certainly much more briefly than we have done today, but I don't think that should put great pressure on you to do an enormous amount of work, as you heard from our colleagues. If in fact in the relatively near future some fairly economically produced cost-benefit analysis could be made available, I think we would find it very useful.

Mr. Robert Marleau: Mr. Chairman, I'll commit to doing it without devoting a disproportionate amount of resources. A ten-year time line allows me to retire and then you can't hold me to the figures.

The Chairman: Thank you very much. Gentlemen, on behalf of the committee, we want to thank you for appearing before us and also for the excellent preparation for this meeting.

That is the end of the meeting.