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, April 11, 2000

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[English]

The Chair (Mr. Derek Lee (Scarborough—Rouge River, Lib.)): I call the meeting to order. We're all engaged in our private discussions, but we're down 13 minutes, so let's get on with our agenda.

Colleagues, today we're going to begin the task of reviewing the standing orders. We have not yet mapped out a complete agenda on that, but I'm sure there is more than ample expertise around the table to take us through this in an orderly fashion.

Up to today we have devoted time to the reference that came to us from the House dealing with the issue of confidentiality. We have not completed that exercise. We are considering the possibility of more evidence through another witness. We're discussing that with the parties around the table.

So pending the resolution of that issue, we'll now embark on the standing order review, specifically the two items that have been moved toward the top because of events that happened here over the last two to four months. The first deals with electronic voting, and the second deals with an earlier notice of motion of the government House leader that gave notice to the House of a possible rule change that would allow a party whip to apply the votes of the members of the party in a regular vote in the House of Commons without there being unanimous consent. You should have in front of you a copy of the text of that.

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This committee and its subcommittee previously reviewed electronic voting from various perspectives.

We have with us the clerk of the House, Mr. Marleau, and Mr. Corbett, the deputy clerk. Unless there are other suggestions from members around the table, I'm going to ask Mr. Marleau or Mr. Corbett if they have any comments they might wish to give to us to help us with, one, motion 9, dealing with application of votes by a party whip, or to open the issue of electronic voting.

Mr. Jay Hill (Prince George—Peace River, Canadian Alliance): I have a point of order.

The Chair: Yes, Mr. Hill.

Mr. Jay Hill: Mr. Chairman, with the indulgence of the committee, under other business, just in case I get called away before we adjourn, I wonder if we could take care of a housekeeping item. I would move that Dave Chatters replace Deborah Grey on the subcommittee on private members' business. I'd ask that we take care of that, if it's acceptable to everyone.

The Chair: There's a motion by Mr. Hill, as stated. I'll put the motion. All agreed?

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: It's carried unanimously.

Mr. Jay Hill: Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you.

Now back to agenda of the day. Mr. Bergeron.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron (Verchères—Les-Patriotes, BQ): Point of order. Perhaps you have already explained this, but I had to leave for a few minutes. Are Mr. Strahl's proposals that we have before us simply in addition to the proposals that we have to date on changes to the Standing Orders?

Thank you for the first answer, Mr. Chairman.

I have a second question, Mr. Chairman. I would like to know if there is a particular reason why we are starting our review of the Standing Orders specifically with Motion No. 9.

[English]

The Chair: Is there a reason why? I think it would be fair to say that somehow I, in the chair, in my list-making, in my discussions with members of the committee, simply perceived that this one had bubbled its way to the top.

Maybe one of the government members could comment on that. Mr. Kilger.

Mr. Bob Kilger (Stormont—Dundas—Charlottenburgh, Lib.): I could speak from the perspective of our own party, the government side. This is the issue within caucus that has drawn attention more than any other. For that reason we felt it was important to bring it out very early, at the earliest opportunity, to discuss it with members of the other parties and see, in the end, what the evaluation is on behalf of everyone.

The Chair: Mr. Bergeron.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: I fully understand the government's concerns, but with all due respect for the process, I must point out that we had a debate on Standing Order reform in the House last year, and at that time, concerns were raised by members from all political parties. It seems to me that out of respect for the concerns that were raised by members at that time, we should not be giving priority to a concern that is, all in all, relatively recent. That does not take away from its importance. Motion No. 9 and the underlying concerns are important and I understand that they might have specific importance for the government, but the fact remains that the concern is relatively recent.

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Concerns were raised quite some time ago by members of all political parties during the debate on Standing Order reform and on other occasions, and Mr. Robertson has compiled them. Unless I am mistaken, when Mr. Robertson took stock of the various proposals made by the various political parties, Motion No. 9 and its underlying concerns were not in the picture at all.

I am not so naive that I do not understand why the government is so inclined to want to make studying Motion No. 9 a priority, but I have trouble understanding why we would adopt Motion No. 9 by setting aside, putting on hold, or toning down, at least for the time being, all of the other concerns and suggestions raised by all of the political parties represented in the House.

[English]

The Chair: I point out to everyone what we already know, that the list of suggestions for changes in the standing orders runs to 50 to 75 suggestions from colleagues all around the House. If we begin to address all of them, in whatever order we choose, that's going to take up a substantial amount of time, and it would be a fairly lengthy exercise, which we're going to have to go into in any event. It was simply the sense of the chair that there were a large number of members in the House who might wish us to deal with the items I've raised today on a priority basis, simply because of risks that are out there in the House, simply because of the current state of the standing orders. So that's where we are now.

I'm going to continue with where we are now, unless I receive another direction from the members. Your comment has been heard and it's perhaps well founded. We'll certainly be getting to all of the suggestions of all of our colleagues in the standing order review.

I'll go to Mr. Hill. Continuing on this discussion?

Mr. Jay Hill: Yes.

Mr. Chairman, in reference to the paper that was prepared for us by Mr. Robertson, I wonder where in that paper you would find this motion 9 or in fact any reference to amending Standing Order 45? Could you draw it to my attention?

The Chair: Yes. It is on page 3 under chapter VI. About halfway down the list you will see Standing Order 45, “applying of votes”. There are a number of suggestions of other members named there. The electronic voting is there as well.

Mr. Jay Hill: Right.

The Chair: I see Catterall, Strahl, Coderre, Redman, Boudria, DeVillers, Alcock, Fontana, Normand. These are all members who have made suggestions in relation to those two areas.

May I continue then?

Mr. Blaikie.

Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg—Transcona, NDP): Mr. Chairman, again, I'm not very happy with the way things unfold here. If there is a disposition on the part of the government to want to deal with Standing Order 45 first, then why don't we have a motion to that effect? Why do we have this kind of nebulous thing that's happening now?

The Chair: I don't know, Mr. Blaikie—

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Why does the chair have to...? I don't know how to describe your behaviour. Is this the idea of the chair? Why pretend that this comes from the committee somehow? It doesn't. It comes from a feeling of urgency on the part of the government.

So why doesn't the meeting open with a speech from one of the government members saying why this has to be dealt with and then have a motion? Then we can debate the motion and have some kind of direction here, instead of this kind of shadow boxing that goes on here that's just really weird. It's like being in some kind of twilight zone.

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Do you have an agenda, or does the government have an agenda? If the government has an agenda, move a motion to deal with Standing Order 45 and we can debate it and vote against it, or amend it or whatever. Then if we decide to deal with Standing Order 45, even if that's on division, we can decide how to deal with it and whether motion 9.... But to just walk in and have the text of motion 9 lying in front of you—which is a government motion, not a recommendation by the committee, not a recommendation by the researcher, not the result of a motion by anybody in the committee, not the result of a debate by anyone in the committee—is really kind of weird.

If the committee decides to deal with Standing Order 45 first, that's the first thing we do, and then we decide what we're going to do. But this is too bizarre for words really.

The Chair: Let me assist you, if I can, to assist members.

First, the pre-eminence of Standing Order 45 and electronic voting comes from a steering committee meeting that was held about two or three weeks ago, I think Tuesday, March 28. At the end of that meeting these two items were flagged for consideration when we had completed our study of the reference from the House. That is where they've come from.

In terms of our needing a motion, the steering committee has in a sense proposed these two items.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Why wasn't that said at the beginning of the meeting? Why do we have to feel around—

The Chair: You've asked the question and I've given you the answer.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Finally.

The Chair: Mr. Knutson.

Mr. Gar Knutson (Elgin—Middlesex—London, Lib.): In defence of the chair, the progress of this committee is somewhat fluid, based on last week's experience, and I hope you don't think from last week that the government is driving the agenda of this committee, because our experience is that we seem to be caught up in a lot of opposition issues, and that was particularly true of the whole issue of confidentiality and how many meetings—

Mr. Bill Blaikie: That was referred to us by the House.

Mr. Gar Knutson: —and how many witnesses we were going to have and whether we were going to close off last week and just do a report. I haven't been privy to them, but there have been discussions about how many more witnesses we're going to have and when we're going to close off last week's discussion.

In the meantime, the government would like us to get on with dealing with the rules. If I can speak for the government for a second, our preference would be that we deal with a small doable package that would have both input from this side and the opposition side. I don't know what the opposition is going to want in terms of this small, initial package, but in the meantime we're submitting motion 9 as our input into the initial package.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Are you now submitting it, because nobody has submitted it yet? In fact, it was lying in front us when we came in. That's what I mean; there's no context.

Mr. Gar Knutson: That's our intent.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Well, get on with it then!

Mr. Gar Knutson: I would like to move, since I have the floor—

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Why are we dealing with this? Why don't we hear the witnesses first then? That's what I mean.

Mr. Gar Knutson: I still have the floor. I was trying to be helpful.

I would like to move that the committee recommend to the House the adoption of motion 9, with two minor changes: on line 3, where it says “Government Orders”, that this become “to a Government Order”. Add the word “a” and take the letter “s” from “Orders”. That was it.

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As I say, from my own personal point of view, I'd be happy to hear other things that we might want to pass as an initial package of rule changes. Our desire is to at least get some things changed; this is our first priority. There shouldn't be any secret about that.

We're open to hearing what the opposition says. And I'll say, for the record again, that I don't want to railroad this through, but by the same token we don't want it to drag on for an unreasonable period of time.

The Chair: Okay. Just to help colleagues, Mr. Blaikie was quite fairly questioning the genesis of our agenda. I'll make explicit reference here to item 4 of our steering committee report, which was adopted by this committee. It reads:

4. That the Committee proceed with its study on parliamentary reform, with particular reference to Motion No. 9 and electronic voting following the conclusion of its hearings on the Order of Reference concerning the confidentiality....

So thank you, Mr. Knutson, for putting something on the table.

Mr. Bergeron has a...this is a point of order, I presume.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: Yes, Mr. Chairman. I am not speaking to the motion again. I simply want to say that I fully understand, as I pointed out earlier on, what is motivating the government with respect to Motion No. 9. What I was having a bit of trouble understanding was why we are starting our review of the Standing Orders specifically with that motion.

You reminded us of a decision that was made by this committee and that highlights two issues: Motion No. 9 and electronic voting. Mr. Chairman, to my mind, that still does not explain why we are starting this morning with Motion No. 9 rather than with the electronic voting. Nor does it explain why we did not start our review of the Standing Orders by outlining the agenda: what our schedule would be; what we will begin with; when we plan to wrap up; the order in which we will deal with the issues; what witnesses we want to hear, and so on.

Normally, when we start a study, committee members are given an opportunity a little bit ahead of time to determine the timeframe. Generally, that takes place at the Sub-Committee on Agenda and Procedure. In this case, we have no timeframe. We are simply being told this morning that we must deal with Motion No. 9, that we will be adopting Motion No. 9, that we would recommend that the House adopt Motion No. 9, and that we will then move on to the other issues.

That seems to be a highly irregular way of operating in this committee. The recommendation to which you were referring, Mr. Chairman, never stipulated, at any point in time, that we had to adopt Motion No. 9, refer it to the House, adopt a resolution on electronic voting, refer it to the House, and then deal with all of the other aspects of the review of the Standing Orders.

The motion states that we will start our review of the Standing Orders with, on a priority basis, Motion No. 9 and then electronic voting, or electronic voting and then Motion No. 9. The order is not established. I do not understand why we would undertake a general review of the Standing Orders, but only after having adopting Motion No. 9 and recommending its adoption to the House.

If Mr. Knutson had agreed to Mr. Blaikie's suggestion to move that this committee examine Motion No. 9, that would have already been more acceptable than saying that he was moving that Motion No. 9 be recommended to the House. We have not even discussed it yet, and you are already presenting us with the outcome. We have just drafted the report. The committee report has just been drafted with Mr. Knutson's motion. Could we discuss it beforehand? Could we have an opportunity to suggest some amendments and some corrections before adopting the report? Mr. Knutson's recommendation is to adopt the report before the committee has an opportunity to examine the issue.

[English]

The Chair: I'd like the committee to get to examining this as soon as we can.

Ms. Parrish, and then Mr. Kilger. Then, unless some procedural motion gets moved, I think we'll go right to our witnesses and get on with our business.

Ms. Carolyn Parrish (Mississauga Centre, Lib.): I was going to comment on the fact that Mr. Knutson has moved this. Are we not in discussion of his motion yet?

The Chair: I don't recall the wording of his motion, but it certainly puts it on the floor for discussion.

Ms. Carolyn Parrish: I would support the motion wholeheartedly. If there's an implication by the opposition that the government has a vested interest in this, let me just explain to you—and I don't like getting personal—that those of us who are past middle age and getting into our dotage still have not recovered from the all-night sessions. My health has not recovered. When I go home on the weekends, I'm miserable with my family. I need a couple of weeks off. That really threw me off. And I think it's a vested interest, or a stronger interest, on our part, because you guys can come and go as you please during those votes, but we have to stay there because we have to make sure the government doesn't fall.

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So this, to me, is a priority for everybody in the House on our side. And it should be a priority to people on the other side as well. This is a brutalization of human beings, and it has had a profound effect on my feeling of how I enjoy being here and what I find is a proper or orderly running of government. So if it seems to be precipitous—and we've had a very good explanation for it—then I would move that we get on with business, support this, and get on with the rest of it.

The Chair: Okay. Mr. Kilger, did you want to say something?

Mr. Bob Kilger: I was simply going to see if the chair could start the testimony of the witnesses and come back to our discussion of motion 9 afterward.

The Chair: Sure. I did intend to ask the witnesses to comment on motion 9 as soon as.... Are there more points of order to discuss before we begin?

Mr. Hill.

Mr. Jay Hill: Well, I just want it on the record, Mr. Chairman, that I think whether or not it is inconvenient for any member of Parliament to sit through an all-night session of voting is irrelevant to the discussion at hand. The fact is that the opposition feels it has been forced to take these extraordinary means to try to draw the attention of the general public to the way in which this government is operating and ramming legislation through. So I don't feel bad at all. And if that little diatribe was meant to make us feel some compassion, I'm sorry, it didn't work.

The Chair: Okay.

Ms. Carolyn Parrish: For the record, Mr. Chairman, I didn't say it was inconvenient; I said it was brutalizing.

The Chair: Okay, we're not hitting the nail on the head just yet, colleagues, and I'd like to get to the business we're discussing.

Mr. Harvey, do you want to say something quickly?

[Translation]

Mr. André Harvey (Chicoutimi, PC): Mr. Chairman, I wanted to say that I agree with my colleagues. In fact, some exceptional steps have been taken in recent weeks, and I find that the committee's agenda has been modified on a highly selective basis. You have shown up this morning with this motion. You had quite a mysterious look about you, didn't you? I was under the impression that it was because you showed up with Motion No. 9 and the other emergency, electronic voting, but without our having had an opportunity ahead of time to discuss the agenda in a bit more of a substantive and orderly fashion.

In fact, our colleague has just explained the real reason: the government has been a bit thrown off by the initiatives of recent weeks. But there is one thing that the government will never be able to do, and that is abolish the opposition. That is impossible. The role of the opposition is to speak out, and I find it unfortunate that we did not have an opportunity to discuss the agenda for the next few weeks in a more orderly fashion, as Stéphane pointed out. You show up with two motions that will enable the government to steam ahead and look at everything that is going on.

What happened with Bill C-20 is serious: the committee was denied the right to travel and to hear from all Canadians. I do not want to rehash the debate, but it was important. So I understand the government's interest in the short term, but I do find that it is taking exceptional action. We do not experience this type of action every day, and I think the committee is being pressured a little bit. That is quite difficult to accept.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Harvey, your attention has been drawn explicitly to the report of the subcommittee on procedure, which contained reference to our business today and was adopted by this committee previously. So it is not a surprise to you. If it is a surprise, it's because you haven't done your homework.

Now, do colleagues want to spend the rest of the morning taking shots across the table on the political dynamic of the House or do we want to get down to our business at hand? I think I know where the chair wants to go.

I'm going to—this is the fourth intervention you've made this morning, Mr. Bergeron. We're going into number four here.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: I want to address what you just said, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

The Chair: We're not going to be able to function as a committee if every time somebody says something, everybody else wants to reply. It's not a debate on what I said. You may take what I just said as chair as an attempt to provide some direction for us here this morning.

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Now, do you still want to say something, Mr. Blaikie?

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Yes, I wanted to inquire then.... People are eager to hear the witnesses, and I'm always eager to hear Mr. Marleau and Mr. Corbett. Are they here to talk about motion number 9?

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Specifically?

The Chair: Generally.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Generally. What's the difference between a general and a specific discussion of motion number 9?

The Chair: The clerk of the House has—

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Are they here to talk about the review of the standing orders, or have they been enlisted or conscripted—or whatever the appropriate word is—in the agenda that we have before us by virtue of the motion we have before us?

The Chair: The answer is that they have seen our agenda and they are aware that we're discussing the notice of motion number 9, Standing Order 45, and electronic voting.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: So that's what they're here for. They're not here for the general task of the review of the standing orders.

The Chair: They're aware that we're getting to that and they have prepared themselves for that as well. I can't imagine—

Mr. Bill Blaikie: So we're going to hear evidence on a whole raft of things, but then we're just going to decide on this one thing.

The Chair: Right now, I think we'll have questions of the witnesses on Standing Order 45, and the committee will be governed by whoever moves and does what around the table.

Mr. Jay Hill: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, you just made reference to the fact that the witnesses have seen our agenda and that specifically or generally—I guess your term was “generally”—they're going to apply themselves to motion number 9. Nowhere on the agenda do I see any reference to either motion number 9 or changes to Standing Order 45. It simply says:

Committee's mandate under Standing Order 108(3)(a)(iii) - consideration of proposals on changes to the Standing Orders.

The Chair: Next.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: Mr. Chairman, I will be very brief. You said, and I agree with you, that it is not a surprise to be discussing either Motion No. 9 or electronic voting. What is surprising, Mr. Chairman, is that we have chosen to make it a priority to study Motion No. 9 without having discussed it on one hand, and on the other hand, to see that the government wants to completely separate Motion No. 9 from the review of Standing Orders, which was not set out in the report that we adopted.

[English]

The Chair: Okay. Are there any other interventions? No? Let's go on to hearing from the witnesses then.

Mr. Marleau or Mr. Corbett, have you any wisdom that you could impart to us on the importance or utility of the draft text of motion number 9?

Mr. Robert Marleau (Clerk of the House of Commons): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First let me apologize for my state of undress.

Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

The Chair: The record should show that Mr. Marleau is not undressed; he is simply in normal street clothes and not in his clerk's gown.

An hon. member: That's a very nice suit.

Mr. Robert Marleau: Thank you.

An hon. member: It's very appropriate.

Mr. Robert Marleau: Thank you very much. I don't often get the opportunity.

As to the text of motion number 9, when it saw its genesis on the Order Paper and Notice Paper, we looked at it in the context of the letter the chairman sent to me in December. That letter listed the intentions of the committee in this review—which was to begin in February—as being to talk about report stage procedures in the House of Commons, including voting on amendments. You set the agenda, gentlemen and we respond to your questions—

[Translation]

and ladies too,

[English]

ladies.

In looking at the text as it is written on the Order Paper and Notice Paper, and in looking at the change suggested by Mr. Knutson, I believe the text attempts to institutionalize the practice you've had in place by unanimous consent. In the report stage concept over context, over 60% of the divisions held in the last Parliament and this Parliament have been used with this kind of formula, by unanimous consent. At the present time, that's the only way you can access this procedure. If you like, it's made up every time to some degree. I think the only problem that I can identify with it—and it's not one that's just based on some of the difficulties experienced last night—is that there's no confusion resolution mechanism. I guess I could put it that way, because I don't want to say conflict.

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When there are a large number of these motions, I think the draft does not address the issue of a whip making a mistake or a member making a mistake. With the large number of motions that are there, what is the recourse for redress to the member when a whip has applied his vote in a way in which the member may not wish to have it applied? For that matter, when the whip himself has made an error in earnest,

[Translation]

how can he set the record straight for his party, if I can put it that way, in a context of confusion, haste or the like?

It can also be a mistake. The charts we work with are not always perfect. Sometimes they are prepared at the last minute, and when there are many of them, legitimate mistakes can be made. We can confuse Motion No. 8 and Motion No. 18. So this small mechanism is missing. I know that it is difficult in a multiparty system to go back over something that occurred 40 minutes earlier, because a decision on a given amendment can have an impact on a series of later amendments. Someone could always claim, if a backbencher wants to change his vote, that he has already voted and wants to change his vote because of a trend that has developed as the vote unfolded rather than because of a simple mistake. I will not impute motives like that, certainly not as clerk, but that is why we currently require unanimous consent to change a vote.

The sequence can be very important, with respect to both the content of the decisions and the political party's position. So perhaps we should come up with a method that would make it possible, when there are a large number of votes, when there may be confusion and when the member may, legitimately, have made a mistake in voting, for the member to be able to change his vote, either by way of a decision from the Chair, or by writing it clearly in the text. The member may have been ill-informed, or the documentation may have been inadequate. I think that is the only element that might need examining.

[English]

The Chair: Do you have any comments, Mr. Corbett?

Mr. William Corbett (Deputy Clerk of the House of Commons): No. I share the same opinion as the clerk, Mr. Chairman. Of course, the only other question not addressed in the body of the amendment, which is a formalization of the practice, is the whole question of the reading of the amendments to the House and the time it takes to do so.

The Chair: Would you want to open up that issue now? If you would, just frame the relationship of the reading of the amendments to the time taken in votes.

Mr. William Corbett: It's a very complex matter, Mr. Chairman, in terms of the way the whole process of report stage evolves and in terms of the number of times motions have to be read. Certainly in the case where the issue is under a time allocation order, there's a compression of the motions being moved and seconded. They have to be read at that time. They have to again be read at the moment the question is put to the House for the yeas and nays. Those are then deferred, by our process, to the end if a recorded division is requested by five members rising. There is then the additional process of putting the recorded division to the House.

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The Chair: Just to refresh everybody's memory, at report stage, are all the amendments that are proposed and moved read while, during, and at the end of debate, or are there amendments that have to be read in the House later with regard to the division, or are they read at both times?

Mr. William Corbett: Unless the House gives its consent to dispense, they would be read at both times.

The Chair: Okay. Thank you.

Now we'll go to questions. Mr. Hill.

Mr. Jay Hill: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for appearing today.

First of all, I want to say that we generally support making some change here and basically institutionalizing the existing practice. But of course this moves much beyond the existing practice.

A suggestion my colleague Mr. Strahl made, in my understanding, wouldn't have gone quite this far. It would have just basically eliminated the need for unanimity in the application of votes. So while it moved toward institutionalizing the present practice, it didn't go so far as to say that the whip would make that decision for his or her party. Under Mr. Strahl's proposal the House would allow the application of votes unless five members stood. I just want that on the record.

There are two issues I want to deal with. One is a further explanation of how motion 9 would work if adopted. Secondly, I want to deal at a little bit more length with the prospect of mistakes and how we would correct those.

First of all, how would you envision this working? The way I read it, one of the problems with the way it's drafted is that the whip would get up and indicate whether his or her party was going to apply the vote unless members of his or her party got up and indicated otherwise. Now, as the whip of the Canadian Alliance, my concern would be that you're basically going to put into the standing orders a system whereby future divisiveness within the ranks of a party could be evident to all who are watching a vote. In other words, the whip would get up and say yes, we want to apply it, and then perhaps a number of members would get up and challenge the whip. Is that how you see this standing order change working?

Mr. Robert Marleau: As written, I certainly see it working along the lines you just described. It does provide for any member who does not want to vote along the lines the whip has indicated to so indicate. For most members I suppose that's primary in their concerns about voting in the House of Commons.

As to the issue of whether this would encourage division or make it more visible, I think it's just a matter of when it becomes visible. If the member is intent on voting differently from his party, he or she will stand up at one moment or another. It may make the disagreement between whip and member a little more concrete in the statements that might be made, but sooner or later, if the member is not voting along the line the party has chosen, he or she will rise in the House and be seen to rise accordingly.

It's a judgment call on your part as to whether this encourages a contest of party discipline or makes the whip's job more challenging. I'm really not in a position to comment as to where that tendency will take us. There are probably some who would say that this is the first nick in breaking down party discipline. The ultimate gesture of the member is to rise in his or her seat.

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Mr. Jay Hill: With regard to the way it's worded, let's walk through a scenario. Let's say we have a vote and Mr. Kilger rises and indicates that the government is going to apply their vote on that particular motion, and it does so. I rise. If one member from my party were to rise and indicate that he didn't want to vote the way I as whip said, would that then necessitate the Canadian Alliance in its entirety of the members present that night doing a standing vote, or would just that one member do a standing vote?

Mr. Robert Marleau: As I read it, as written, it would be just that one member making that choice.

Mr. Jay Hill: In other words, if you had a true free vote—and of course we all recognize that every vote in the House of Commons is a free vote—you could have a scenario where you would be trying to apply the vote and then would end up taking longer actually to take the vote if half your caucus then rose one at a time and indicated they were voting the opposite way.

Mr. Robert Marleau: I would assume that as whip you would not take the initiate to launch this standing order if you knew that your party was—

Mr. Jay Hill: Divided.

Mr. Robert Marleau: —voting in different ways and allow them to rise and vote in a normal fashion. The whip has the initiative here, and the member has a response.

Mr. Jay Hill: Unless, of course, your objective that evening were to prolong the vote, which is what this very standing order change is supposed to get around. It's to try to speed up the vote and take a tool away from the opposition parties.

Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

Mr. Jay Hill: Since you raised it, Mr. Marleau, I'd like to have a minute to get to the issue of the potential for a mistake to be made. My understanding is that the way it operates at present requires unanimity to apply votes. No party can apply votes if there's one member in attendance who disagrees. Is that correct?

Mr. Robert Marleau: Correct.

Mr. Jay Hill: Yet if there's a mistake made while we're applying votes, we need unanimity to correct that mistake. Is that correct?

Mr. Robert Marleau: Correct.

Mr. Jay Hill: Doesn't it bother you that there seems to be a bit of an imbalance there? If we adopted this, we would take away the requirement for unanimity to apply votes. But as it's presently written, there would still be a requirement for unanimity to correct a mistake that became apparent because of the application of votes.

Mr. Robert Marleau: I don't see it as an imbalance. I see the first as being a process and the second as being a result. I think you need unanimity to change the result as compared with whatever you want to put into place to facilitate a process or, in your words, to accelerate a process. But once the vote is cast, you have a result. In a minority Parliament it can make a big difference as to whether the motion passes or fails whether it's a supply day or a government order. With regard to the imbalance you see of the unanimity applying to one and not to the other, at the present time it takes unanimous consent to change a vote of a member once cast. I think it's because you're dealing with the result.

The Chair: Just for the record, during the voting process a member is quite capable of rising and clarifying his or her vote. That's while the vote is on.

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes.

The Chair: But when the vote is concluded and the result announced, then the vote is over, and unanimous consent would be required. Is that correct?

Mr. Robert Marleau. That's correct.

The Chair: Okay.

Mr. Bergeron.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: Mr. Chairman, I will start with a comment and then I will go back to the issue of changing a vote in the event that a mistake is made. The clerk seems to be saying that it might be necessary to foresee, in the event that Motion No. 9 is adopted, a mechanism to make it possible to correct, if necessary, a mistake made by a member or the whip.

In light of the answers provided in response to questions by my colleague Jay Hill, I am somewhat under the impression that the mechanism could be put in place now, or we could decide not to have such a mechanism and to continue with the current process, in other words correcting potential mistakes by members or whips to unanimous consent when the results are announced.

• 1200

So the issue of correcting the mistake, in my opinion—and I invite the clerk to comment on this—is not more acute now than in the past. We can currently correct a mistake with unanimous consent and once Motion No. 9 has been adopted, we will be able to continue correcting a mistake with unanimous consent, just like we could have adopted a correction mechanism earlier, so that it could be in force now, along with the current process.

Perhaps Mr. Marleau would like to comment on that or correct me if I'm wrong.

Mr. Robert Marleau: I would like to make a short comment, Mr. Bergeron. I agree with you that unanimous consent applies in both cases under current practices.

I was proposing that you consider a mechanism that would make it possible to resolve the problem with respect to confusion, because when one member speaks for another, votes for him in the House, and the member subsequently realizes that a mistake was made, he seems a bit vulnerable to me. If he is bound by unanimous consent for action taken by another member who voted for him, it seems to me that you should at least consider the possibility of some recourse when the mistake is legitimate. That is the only difference I see between process A and process B, with unanimous consent or without unanimous consent.

Even if the member has already authorized his whip to vote in his place, pursuant to the Standing Order, do we really want to put him in this situation in the event of some confusion, a disagreement or an error?

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: With respect to the reading of amendment motions that Mr. Corbett very surreptitiously referred to earlier, I would simply like to point out, for everyone's benefit, that negotiations are currently underway between the Chair and the leaders on this issue. Some of us are probably not aware of the situation. In all likelihood, either the leaders will look into the issue and make changes or they will ask us to do so. Right now, this issue is up in the air.

Mr. Chairman, I would also like to make some initial comments about Motion No. 9 in general. I wanted to do this before I asked my question, but as I was making my presentation, it so happened that I asked my question first. Like Mr. Hill, I'm rather concerned about the impact that this motion will have on the members. I view this motion as additional pressure that will be put on the members. It is one thing to vote against your party, but it's another thing to have to rise and state: I am voting against my party. This will be seen as additional pressure and as a challenge to the whip's authority. Do we want to support an initiative that will result in colleagues, who wish to vote against their party in the House, having to openly challenge the authority of the whip? Do we want members to have to overcome twice the number of hurdles in order to vote against their party?

Some may wonder whether or not this is the first step to the dismantling of party discipline. Others may conclude that this is another step that has been added to party discipline, because additional pressure is being placed on the members, because they are being given even less opportunity to express themselves differently, if they wish to do so.

However, I would like to add to what Mr. Hill had to say about the fact that Motion No. 9 may have the opposite impact than that sought by the government. If the opposition parties decided to play the game and to have all of their members vote against their whip, one after the other, not only would they be standing up, but they would all be speaking, one after the other. That may very well prolong the procedure in the House. I think that the government should examine that aspect of the issue.

[English]

The Chair: I'm sorry, Mr. Bergeron, did you leave that as a question? Have you concluded your comments?

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: Yes.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Blaikie.

• 1205

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Perhaps I'll pick up where Mr. Bergeron left off. What he has just said is true, except that the likelihood of all parties employing that tactic at the same time is very remote.

What I understood motion 9 to be about, in its essence, if you like, when it was first proposed, was really to prevent one party from holding everyone else hostage to that particular method. So if at some point the Bloc, the Alliance, or any other opposition party wants to do what you've just described, they're free to do that.

What they are not free to do is to compel other parties to do the same thing, and in both cases where this has become an issue, for instance, on Bill C-20 or on the Nisga'a bill—in the Nisga'a case we would have had only the Reform Party doing this. The rest of the House would have quite gladly voted in a bloc, and the same applies to Bill C-20.

So I think you're right about that, but it would only apply in those cases where the entire opposition—

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: It might belong anyway.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: It might belong, but it's only....

Anyway, I just wanted to say that. But in respect of all the issues that have been raised, I think the whips would have to decide, if they had significant division within their caucus, whether or not they wanted to go about it that way or whether they wanted to vote individually and have whatever division exists within a caucus revealed in the normal way by people rising at a different time, although that would still be difficult to do.

The mechanics of this are still difficult. The way we do it now, people vote in a bloc and members rise to say they wish to have their vote recorded differently. But if a particular party wanted to vote individually—not individually in the sense of having individuals dissent from what the whip has said, but vote individually—how would that take place?

When we vote as a bloc, the chair does not say, all those in favour, please rise, and all those opposed. The chair says, are you ready for the question, and then the government whip gets up, and in this case, he would say, pursuant to whatever standing order this would become part of, we're going to do it this way.

Knowing in this case it's the Bloc Québécois that has decided to vote individually, would the chair then say, all those in the Bloc Québécois in favour of the motion, please rise, and all those opposed....? You're not doing that for the House.

I'm not sure the actual sort of choreography of this has been thought through. I confess to not having thought it through myself until I was sitting here asking how this will happen. I don't know whether our witnesses can be of any help to us on that.

Going back to the original question of looking at the report stage thing and at electronic voting, I think the electronic voting is a much longer-term thing. Of course, it has been very long term; it was first recommended in 1985. Frankly, there just isn't any way of dealing with that in the short term.

I think we need to do something, preferably, that we can all agree on, and perhaps two things need to happen in order to make that possible. First, we need to work out a little bit better what it is we have in front of us pursuant to the point I just raised. Secondly, we need to look at whether there's something we could put into this very small package—at this point, a one-sided package, although it's not totally one-sided in the sense of government versus opposition and in the sense that I think what has happened reflects on the whole House and affects all members of the House. At the same time, it will be seen as government-related, and it is, in the sense that there is some truth in the argument that opposition parties make. Their argument is that one of the reasons these kinds of things develop is that there's a feeling that there isn't enough tolerance of real debate in the House on issues of importance.

• 1210

I wonder whether we couldn't think as a group about something we could add to this package that would make it more balanced. That is to say, we could do something with respect to closure, with respect to time allocation, that would meet the opposition's concern about time allocation. Then we could do this. Make this an interim measure, whatever it is we come up with, this package deal.

I have a suggestion, for instance, which is not unlike Mr. Strahl's, although it goes a little further. At one point, when you moved time allocation, there was a two-hour debate on time allocation itself up until 1991. I'm thinking of trying to go back to something like that, only somewhat different. That is to say, there should be some kind of price the government pays for moving time allocation. I use “price” in the best sense of the word. Right now you have “price” in the worst sense of the word: if you guys move closure, we're going to make you pay, you're going to vote all night, Carolyn Parrish is going to be miserable—

Ms. Carolyn Parrish: And she's normally so charming.

Voices: Oh, oh!

Mr. Bill Blaikie: —and we're all going to suffer.

A voice: Amen!

Mr. Bill Blaikie: There should be some kind of a good price to pay. I'm wondering whether it couldn't be in terms of.... If you move time allocation, immediately following time allocation the minister has to be available in the House for a certain period of time, an hour or two hours or whatever we decide, to answer questions. The questions would have a limit so that many people would get a question.

If the minister wants to get this bill through, let the minister come down to the House and face questions from the opposition for a prescribed period of time. It could be something like that. Then whatever we come up with, we could say it expires at the end of this year or at the end of this Parliament, whichever expires first. Everyone has an incentive to come up with a better package because this one is going to expire and we're going to go back to the rules we had if we don't come up with a better package that's part of a larger package, part of the review of the standing orders.

Anyway, that's my thinking at this point. I think if we were looking for a way to do something constructive rather than just having one particular view imposed on everyone else, we could talk about what could be added to this. At most times—certainly when I have spoken about this and when others have spoken about this—we've said this is related to our overall sense of frustration. When something very important is being debated, we tend to have two or three days of debate and that's it.

If we could insert something into it that would put this compensatory mechanism into time allocation and couple it with this and make an interim measure, we would have the makings of something we could take back to the House rather expeditiously and something we could all defend. At least that's my judgment at this point. We still have to figure out the choreography of how to do what we have before us now.

I leave it at that, Mr. Chairman.

The Chair: Is there any comment from Mr. Marleau or Mr. Corbett on choreography?

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes. Mr. Blaikie is quite right that there's no provision in the standing orders for the choreography. I assume that would be articulated by the chair, as it was when the House changed the manner in which they voted on private members' bills. When we varied the traditional way of voting row by row, the chair made a statement and said to the House—

Mr. Bill Blaikie: But even then we all voted the same way. This is more difficult than that.

• 1215

Mr. Robert Marleau: In calling for the yeas, if one party were choosing to vote through its whip, I imagine only that person would be rising. In calling for the nays, if an opposition party were rising to vote according to the traditional method, the leader or the acting leader for the day would rise, which is the first one we would recognize, and then it would proceed row by row in order of precedence of the party.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: So you would do the yeas and nays but you wouldn't do the whip to whip to whip the way you do it now.

Mr. Robert Marleau: No, I think this would be it. If this were in place, we would go through the yeas and nays and keep the script as simple as possible, with the signal coming from the party on their intentions. That's the way I would script it.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: I can see that, yes.

Mr. William Corbett: Excuse me, Mr. Chair. It is a three-part process in the sense that you have the parties who wish to vote in the traditional fashion rising first. The next step would be those who wish to vote through a whip. Then the third is those who wish to rise in opposition to the way their whip has just voted them.

Mr. Robert Marleau: In the calling of yeas and nays, when the whip from the Reform Party rises to signal their intent and another member in Reform rises at the same time, there doesn't have to be the discourse Mr. Bergeron was referring to. That would be obvious right there and then.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: I think I can see it. Boy, it's going to be fun. Let's face it; all this does is reduce the amount of time. It doesn't make it the most expeditious thing on the face of the planet. If you have a lot of amendments, it's still going to take time, but it's not going to take anywhere near the amount of time it does now.

As far as the reading of the amendments is concerned, I think that's something that has to be dealt with separately. I don't know. We'll see what people think of my suggestion.

The Chair: When the current process for voting works, it may literally be worth a million bucks over time in terms of time saved. When it doesn't work, we're back to our routine ways.

I'm going to go to Ms. Catterall and then Mr. Harvey and Mr. Bonin.

Ms. Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West—Nepean, Lib.): I want to use Mr. Blaikie's word and say that I think one of the things we're all interested in doing is making sure that all of us don't expire before the Parliament or the session does. I totally endorse Ms. Parrish's comment that this is not a healthy way to work or to live. We should all know that, especially those of us who have been parents or doctors.

If we can save some time, it's certainly better than what we have now. It simply means that those who choose to follow the traditional way of voting on any particular division are free to do it. Those who choose not to are free to do it. It seems to me that's a reasonable compromise.

I also agree with Mr. Blaikie that this should be an interim measure, at least until this committee reports on a full review of the standing orders. I think that puts a little more incentive—I won't say pressure—for the committee to do that job and to do it thoroughly.

I think it also gives us an opportunity. We've all talked about implementing in the standing orders a process that, over the few years since it was developed for applying votes, has saved us a lot of time. It has saved a lot of costs to the House of Commons and it hasn't taken away substantially from members' roles in actually voting on legislation or amendments to legislation. We've all talked about implementing it in the standing orders. Doing it now on an interim basis would be a good opportunity to test out how it can work, and then we can deal with fine-tuning as part of our full package of recommendations on amendments to the standing orders.

I'd certainly be happy to support any amendment Mr. Blaikie might want to move on making this an interim measure.

I did also want to address the question of how we deal with it when people feel their votes have been wrongly recorded. We've had situations in applying votes where in the end there are too many people differing with what the whip had to say and we just decided to go ahead and take a recorded vote. That flexibility is always there, but what happened in the House last night was a little bit different.

• 1220

I guess I'd like to ask this of Mr. Marleau. Right now, if somebody is recorded in the wrong way from what they intended, in a way in which they don't want to be recorded—let's say they stood up...and we've had cases like that on both sides of the issue, in which people voted twice, as a matter of fact—don't they need the consent of the House right now to change their vote and the way it's recorded?

Mr. Robert Marleau: If they request it before the result is announced, the chair will usually accept the member's choice. After the result is announced, the member does require unanimous consent.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Yes, and I was fairly surprised last night when the whip of one of the recognized parties asked that the vote of his members be changed and there wasn't the consent of the House to do that. Frankly, I found that quite rude.

Anyway, we're in no different a situation if we were to implement this way of voting than we are right now if somebody feels their vote has been wrongly recorded. If they raise the point before the vote is announced, they can have it changed on request. If they raise it after it's announced, it has to be by consent.

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes, that's correct.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: I'm sure that's something we'll want to look at as we deal with the standing orders in an integrated way, but, again, I think having a trial period on this might in fact help us with our full report on the standing orders.

I had one more question, perhaps for Mr. Knutson, as to the government's intention. It's just about a minor wording of the bill. It says that

after the announcement of a result of a division, the Whip of any officially recognized party may indicate how the votes of the Members of his or her party shall be applied on any subsequent division or divisions....

Now, do we mean the whip can stand up and say that on votes 3, 10, 15, 40, and 730 the Liberal members will vote thus and so? Or do we mean that as each of those divisions is called, the whip will have the opportunity to announce how the members of the party will vote? What's our intention here, the first or the second?

Mr. Robert Marleau: There are two things governing it. If there are two votes, two second readings of a bill, each is called separately. When the second is called, the whip would then use his or her preferred methodology.

In the context of report stage, the Speaker has groupings, and within those groupings there's already a voting pattern established. What's happening here is the whip gets up, and how his party voted on group one will now apply to group three or four or five, or whatever pattern was set out by the Speaker. So at report stage it's a little more complex because of the way they've been grouped and set up for voting. The whip is dealing with a division in the same context, and not future divisions, if you like.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Okay. So it's each division then.

Mr. Robert Marleau: The result of one division is to apply to subsequent divisions. But within the report stage, that could be—

Ms. Marlene Catterall: To the subsequent division or to the ten to come? I guess I'm really asking Mr. Knutson what the intention of the government is here.

Mr. Gar Knutson: Let's say we had three days of voting scheduled. It's not the intention that the whip could stand up once and then we could all take off for three days.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Okay. We can look at this, but it seems to me that we should....

Mr. Gar Knutson: The intention is that we're formalizing what we do now—

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Yes, the same as we do now.

Mr. Gar Knutson: —and no more.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Okay. Then it seems to me that we should take “on any subsequent division or divisions” and move it up in front of “the Whip”. The way it reads right now, it sounds to me like the whip could stand up and say that on the next 100, 700, or 1,000 amendments, the Liberals vote this way. I know that's nitpicking, but this is what—

Mr. Robert Marleau: You could make it more specific if you want to, and we could do that as part of the choreography of the standing order if you wish.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: But it is an amendment that's before us now.

Mr. Robert Marleau: I think the practice so far is that the whip signifies it every time the Speaker puts a question.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Yes, and I think that's what we intend.

Mr. Robert Marleau: I assumed that this was continuing in the same kind of context.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: My question is just this, Mr. Marleau. If that is the intention, shouldn't we take the phrase “on any subsequent division or divisions” and move it up in front of “the Whip” to make the intention clear?

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes, we could arrange the text to make that clear.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Then I'd move that amendment to the motion that's already been moved, Mr. Chair.

• 1225

The Chair: All right.

Do we have that recorded accurately, Madame Clerk? Okay.

Thank you for the suggestion.

Mr. Blaikie.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: Ms. Catterall said she supported my notion of interim, but she didn't indicate whether she supported what I said would be key to my proposal, which is that we have something done about time allocation. So if people aren't going to speak to that, then we have no indication—at least I don't—of whether or not what I said is.... I didn't just say interim; I said interim if this, plus.

Mr. Gar Knutson: On a point of order—

The Chair: Are you sure it's a point of order, Mr. Knutson?

Mr. Gar Knutson: Well, it's just responding.

We'd be prepared to delay a vote on my motion so that we can group it with a vote on a proposal regarding time allocation, and whether that's Mr. Strahl's proposal, which presumably needs to be translated—

An hon. member: I have it in both official languages.

Mr. Gar Knutson: Sorry, I apologize.

If there's some other suggestion, we don't need to vote on this today.

The Chair: Subject to the will of members, the chair didn't see this being voted on today. We have to circulate it amongst our colleagues and allow a bit of time for feedback from the caucuses.

Mr. Bill Blaikie: If we have an indication from the government that they're willing to sit down and try to work things out, then we can sit down and try to work something out.

The Chair: Sure.

Mr. Gar Knutson: Can I add something on the same point of order?

The Chair: Mr. Knutson.

Mr. Gar Knutson: Our preference would be, by Thursday, if that—

The Chair: Let's make sure we do our discussions and allow for some feedback from colleagues in the House and from the caucuses.

I want to recognize Mr. Harvey, and then Mr. Bonin and Mr. Hill.

[Translation]

Mr. André Harvey: I would like to make a clarification, Mr. Chairman. Obviously, we all live with dissent. It is not necessarily a bad thing for all of the parties to experience, from time to time, dissent. Citizens want this to happen. We talk about free votes at great length. However, it is obvious that the greater the opportunity we have for a free vote, the more complicated voting in the House will become.

Hence, as far as modifying the votes are concerned, lets suppose that 20 motions have been carried before the main motion for concurrence in the report is moved. Yesterday, those who had voted for the motion wanted to apply their vote the other way. In the end, I told them to wait, because unanimous consent would be sought to apply the votes before moving the main motion. However, we have to consider the amount of time that elapses between the correction and the adoption of the main motion.

Does the privilege of one member or of six members to be able to make a correction depend absolutely on unanimous consent? We are all involved in politics here. It can happen that, for political reasons, unanimous consent is denied. Personally, this does not bother me. Technically, however, as far as a member is concerned, the privilege of voting is a privilege that transcends unanimous consent. Can the Speaker arbitrarily rule that he will accept changes made to the votes of 6 members on the vote that was held? This is what makes me a little bit uncomfortable. As members, we have the privilege of voting as we see fit. It is perfectly legitimate for a whip to be facing 4, 5, or 6 dissenting members. That is not serious.

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: [Editor's note: Inaudible]

Mr. André Harvey: That's it, more or less. I would like to hear your comments on the matter, Mr. Marleau.

Mr. Robert Marleau: There are two ways to proceed. We have to stipulate, in the Standing Order, the procedure which will enable the member to change his vote and to specify an acceptable time limit in which to do this.

Mr. André Harvey: But will this always be subject to obtaining unanimous consent?

Mr. Robert Marleau: No, I am talking about a situation where it would not be conditional upon obtaining unanimous consent. Otherwise, we can leave it solely up to the discretion of the Speaker, who can rule on the facts that he or she witnessed and state whether or not there was any confusion or whether the Speaker did not explain the situation clearly enough. And the Speaker would decide whether, given what occurred in the House, it would be acceptable for the member or members to change their votes. The Speaker is supposed to be impartial. The Speaker is a witness to the process and could easily decide on the matter.

• 1230

Mr. André Harvey: This would be an additional step that would enable a member to vote as he wished.

The Chair: That's right.

Mr. André Harvey: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Bonin, and then Mr. Hill.

[Translation]

Mr. Raymond Bonin (Nickel Belt, Lib.): I fully support this motion. However, my intervention will be much shorter because many of the comments that I was going to make have already been made and I am not the type of person to repeat what has already been said five times. However, I would like to point out to the committee that we are talking about victims and we appear to be insinuating that the government is always a victim when such strategies are used.

The last time that we had to spend 40 hours on a vote, I remember one of my colleagues said that the situation would have been funnier had the Reform Party not thought about doing that before. However, the fact remains that it was not a recognized party that was the first to use this procedure in the House. It was, instead, an independent member.

It can happen that every party may be victimized by a member of the House of Commons. An independent member can force all of the parties, against their will, to spend hours on a vote. We must, therefore, recognize that all House of Commons members, with the exception of one, can be victims.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Knutson, I had your name here, but because you made an intervention earlier, I was leap-frogging over your name. Do you still want to ask questions?

Mr. Gar Knutson: I do.

The Chair: Okay. I'd better recognize you now before we go to our next member. Mr. Knutson.

Mr. Gar Knutson: To the witnesses, some people, myself included, have a vision that this change is just until we bring in electronic voting. I don't know anything about electronic voting, so I don't feel very strong in that assumption, but is there a proposal sitting somewhere that the committee could look at and say yes or no, or is it your view that we should do a lot of work, sort of go back to square one and tour the world and see how they vote in Rome and lots of other places?

Mr. Robert Marleau: On electronic voting in relation to this, I think in my testimony and that of the previous deputy clerk, Camille Montpetit, before this committee in 1998, we took the position that electronic voting would not save you any time whatsoever over this method.

In other words, it was our view that this methodology is faster than electronic voting, because in electronic voting, you're at least going to have to make a statement to the House as to what the House is voting on, not necessarily reading the whole question but maybe referring to the order paper, and allow some time for members to press the button and some time for the result to come through.

In this case, over a lengthy period of voting, it was our view then, and it remains our view, and I think the new deputy clerk is of the same view, that this is more efficient than electronic voting.

Mr. Gar Knutson: So I'm wrong in that assumption then.

Mr. Robert Marleau: If you're saying electronic voting, if and when it comes to pass, might supplant this, I think if you would do a time analysis on it....

It depends on what you do. Mr. Corbett and I have witnessed voting in the Louisiana legislature, where in a sitting of two months they passed 1,000 bills. It takes about five to eight seconds per vote. But you have to see it to believe it.

In terms of our deliberative assembly—we have a deliberative assembly; they don't—including the fact that honourable members use old golf sticks to vote for someone else....

So you can vote in five seconds, but the context of our deliberative assembly is such that you at least need to know what you're voting on and which party is voting in what sequence on that. We found, depending on how you structure an electronic voting system, if you're going to have large display panels to display the entire text of the question in both official languages, there will be a time delay just to post that, even with the fastest RGB screen.

• 1235

So the format you decide on can in fact slow down the actual process. It's still our view that this kind of formula is more efficient, time-wise, than actual electronic voting.

Mr. Gar Knutson: In terms of Louisiana, you said we had to see it to believe it. So we have to go there. Where else should we go?

Mr. Robert Marleau: It's 40 degrees Centigrade in June in Louisiana.

Mr. Gar Knutson: I'll go in February.

The Chair: Mr. Hill, Mr. Bergeron, and Mr. Kilger.

Mr. Jay Hill: I have a few comments and some questions to ask.

First, in response to Ms. Catterall saying that the present process whereby we can vote for days on amendments is not a healthy way in which to live or work, certainly I would agree with that. But as I said earlier, I think we need to look at the reason the opposition feels they're forced into this type of a process.

The other issue I want to make just a quick comment on is what arose last night, where one whip was requesting to revisit a recorded vote of his members on an earlier vote after some time had elapsed. The problem I see with that is maybe not in the rare circumstance where it would happen, but if we were to put in a process whereby you were allowed to revisit an earlier vote after a period of time had elapsed, I can see again that a particular party, if they wanted to delay the voting process, which is what we're basically discussing here, could use that mechanism to revisit any number of votes. They could once again delay the process by saying “We made a mistake and we want to change this or change that”. Then we get into some sort of debate or discussion about what we're changing and what we're not changing. I just raise that as a possible outcome of making a mechanism.

The third issue I want to briefly mention is to reiterate that what myself and Mr. Bergeron and Mr. Blaikie, I believe, were concerned about is that if we adopt this process, rather than tearing down or at least partially tearing down, if you will, the existing party discipline, it will actually make it more difficult for an individual member.

Under the present system, if you have a split vote in your caucus and you're calling upon the members who are present in the House to rise and vote yea or rise and vote nay, that's all that's necessary. Under this process, as I understand it, the whip would rise and indicate that all of his or her members are voting yea, for example. Then it would be required for any member who was going to vote the other way to rise and speak out against his or her whip and say, “Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I wish to be recorded as voting the other way”.

Let's put it this way. I think it would require even additional intestinal fortitude on the part of the individual member to do that. It's not just rising with all the others who are voting a certain way, but they have to actually rise and speak out in that manner.

Lastly, in reference to Mr. Blaikie's desire, and I think the desire of most of the opposition members, to see at least a bit of a package instead of us dealing with just this motion 9, I would be prepared to put forward a motion on behalf of my colleague, Mr. Strahl, a proposal to make an amendment to the existing standing order that deals with time allocation, with a minor change. I'm not sure whether everyone has a copy of it, but we don't need to be too formal at this stage.

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I'd like to submit it to Mr. Robertson and suggest that he perhaps could come back with one or two or three proposals dealing with that for the consideration of all committee members in conjunction with motion 9. One of the changes I've noted would be on line 14 of the proposal by Mr. Strahl, where it says “to allow Members to ask questions”. We'd then insert “of the Minister” before “and comment briefly on matters relevant to the said motion”.

I would submit that in both official languages to Mr. Robertson, with the informal suggestion at this point that perhaps with the assent of the remaining members of the committee he could come forward at the next meeting with a package, if you will, of the two proposals, or a number of proposals dealing with time allocation and the amended motion number 9, as Mr. Knutson amended his motion. Then we could look at them as a package.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you for submitting it. Mr. Robertson is starting to sweat a little bit here because it's slightly beyond his task to go around and achieve consensus on these kinds of rule changes. But I know he can provide some value-added in assembling something. All members around the table will take note of your representation here in that regard.

Mr. Bergeron.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: Mr. Chairman, as far as the correction mechanism is concerned, is it not true, that right now, when too many members stand, either to request a change or because they have come back to the House and want to make their presence felt, or because they support their political party or God knows what, the Speaker occasionally requests all of the members who want to record their vote to rise in order to do so, thereby avoiding the situation whereby the members have to state whether or not they are for or against something?

Could we eventually provide for this type of mechanism whereby the Speaker, once the vote is over, could ask those who wish to change their vote to rise? We could simply make the change depending on how their vote was recorded. There could be other points of order raised afterwards, but at least the members wouldn't have to rise and state out loud that they were voting against their political party. I think that this would make things even harder for them if we imposed an additional measure on them.

Could we eventually provide for this type of mechanism? I am talking about the mechanism referred to earlier.

Mr. Robert Marleau: You are quite right, Mr. Bergeron. In the scenario I outlined earlier from Mr. Blaikie, I mentioned that when there was a call for yeas and nays, the member who wanted to vote contrary to the directions of his whip could rise without necessarily having to address the Speaker. The French text is perhaps a bit more neutral, but the English text clearly states “the member may request”. As Mr. Hill pointed out, this could trigger a whole series of requests, which you appear to want to avoid.

If the text were amended to make things clear and, for example, the Liberal Party whip were to rise when the yeas were called, state that his party would be voting in favour of the motion, and then be followed by the other parties who would vote in turn, then, when the Speaker calls for the nays, if a Liberal member were to rise, his vote would be duly recorded without his having to make any special intervention. This is the type of scenario that will enable us to establish a process allowing a member to express his disagreement with his party.

I can recall some instances where so many members rose to vote one way or another that the Speaker simply presumed that there was no unanimous consent. We then proceeded to vote in the regular way.

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: This is what Ms. Catterall referred to earlier.

Mr. Robert Marleau: That's right, yes. The traditional scenario whereby the Speaker calls for the yeas and the nays could easily be adapted to make it very clear that the member must rise when the Speaker calls for the option he has selected. That will not necessarily be done in the context of a confrontation with the whip, when the whip intervenes.

[English]

The Chair: We have a short follow-up from Mr. Hill.

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Mr. Jay Hill: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With the indulgence of the committee, I have a point of clarification so that I fully understand what we've been talking about in the context of....

The quickest way right now of applying a vote is when the government whip stands on a point of order, seeks unanimous consent of the House, and then says words to the effect that he seeks unanimous consent to apply the results of the previous vote or previous motion, and he usually names that motion—let's say motion number 1 to motions 17, 19, 25, 39, 49, 146, and on down the list, thereby disposing of a whole number of motions with one point of order, if you will. That is not in this proposed motion 9 whatsoever.

My understanding is that we're not looking at institutionalizing in the standing orders that particular process that we have been using for some time, or at least the government isn't at this point in time, and it would still require unanimity even though it's the fastest way in which to move the voting process along. Is that your understanding?

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes, sir. This does not provide for picking a division and applying by unanimous consent the exact results of the whole House to a group of divisions subsequently to be put to the House. No, that concept is not there at all.

Mr. Jay Hill: So that would still require unanimity?

Mr. Robert Marleau: That would still require it.

Mr. Jay Hill: One member could prevent that from happening?

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes.

Mr. Jay Hill: I wonder if you would care to comment then if you think we would be remiss in adopting motion 9 without addressing that process at the same time and potentially including it in a package, as Mr. Blaikie said.

Mr. Robert Marleau: “Remiss” is a strong word for me to use. The committee never makes a mistake, I'm sure. I tried to position it in the context of where I could see an honourable member being quite aggrieved if some of those issues weren't addressed. I would say over time, while you're trying to avoid the tyranny of the extreme minority here, which is one member saying no, I think there has to be some concern for the tyranny of the absolute majority in the context of a member who may have made a mistake and seeks to redress that gesture. That was what I was trying to put before you.

Mr. Jay Hill: If one member refused consent to do that process I just described, would it then revert to this process if we institutionalize this change versus a standing vote of the entire House?

Mr. Robert Marleau: Yes. If this standing order was operative and in the standing orders, by way of decision of the House following the report of this committee, that would be your default to the other.

Mr. Jay Hill: Thank you.

The Chair: Mr. Knutson.

Mr. Gar Knutson: If we're getting to the end, I have a question for the chair. We've now opened the door onto a huge agenda. It's going to take up a lot of meetings. The tradition in previous years was that these meetings would end at 12:30 p.m. Then when we went to the Canada Elections Act, we in effect had different times with different personnel; it didn't involve the whip so much.

I notice there's no end time on our agenda. I wonder if we can agree that future meetings would end at a certain time so that the whips from the opposition parties would know and the House leaders from the opposition would know. That might be worthwhile.

The Chair: Most members would agree that in good times we could complete our meeting's business in an hour and a half. That would run from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Occasionally we get into a situation where just a few extra minutes can cap a whole item of business, where if we didn't take those few extra minutes we'd be looking at a whole other meeting. Most committees take a couple of hours for a meeting. But if members want to look at 12:30 p.m. as a—

Mr. Jay Hill: An approximate.

The Chair: I'd prefer not to look at it as a drop-dead time. What sometimes happens is we can continue on after 12:30 p.m. to wrap up with various members who have commitments. The chair wouldn't address quorum and we could wrap up the record.

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Perhaps we could consider that at another steering committee meeting. If we could just run the committee on autopilot after 12:30 p.m., so there wouldn't be any votes or dilatory motions, that would provide us with the best of both worlds.

This might not be the best time to provide a drop-dead adjournment time for the committee, but your point's well taken, and I'm sure members have a lot of sympathy for it.

So, colleagues, we've made a good start. We've gotten through the procedural obstacles at the beginning of the meeting. I congratulate you all for your input. There will be some drafting and some discussions before we come back here on Thursday. The record will show that the matter of vote allocations, allocations by the whips, is related to the issue of time allocation, on one end, and the issue of electronic voting on the other. These have all been spoken to. Hopefully, the discussions over the next couple of days, off the record, will bring us a lot closer to a resolution, which we may or may not get to on Thursday.

I'll continue to speak with colleagues about the reference on confidentiality and future witnesses. We'll adjourn now until Thursday.