House of Commons Procedure and Practice
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18. Financial Procedures

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[101]: Constituting the Committee of Supply was the mechanism by which the House might consider supply. Today, the House passes a “continuing order of supply” at the beginning of each session which authorizes it to consider supply at any time. (See Journals, May 13, 1991, p. 13; January 18, 1994, p. 19; February 27, 1996, p. 4; September 23, 1997, p. 14.)
[102]: Bourinot, 1^st ed., p. 491.
[103]: Bourinot, 1^st ed., pp. 496-7.
[104]: See Bourinot, 1^st ed., pp. 497-8.
[105]: See, for example, Debates, July 10, 1905, col. 9085-105.
[106]: Journals, April 9, 1913, pp. 451-2; Debates, April 9, 1913, col. 7409-10; Journals, April 23 and 24, 1913, pp. 507-9.
[107]: Proposals to improve Supply procedures were discussed on a number of occasions between 1913 and 1927 (see, for example, Debates, April 18, 1921, pp. 2193-211; Journals, June 6, 1922, pp. 301-5; Debates, March 5, 1923, pp. 856-7, and March 19, 1923, pp. 1299-307).
[108]: Journals, March 22, 1927, pp. 342-3.
[109]: In 1925, a special committee was established to consider revisions to all Standing Orders. During debate on the motion to appoint the committee, Members expressed concerns regarding parliamentary control over public expenditure, the study of Estimates in Committee and the rules applying to amendments to motions that the Speaker leave the Chair for the House to resolve into the Committee of Supply or the Committee of Ways and Means (Debates, February 23, 1925, pp. 412-29). The issue of referring Estimates to standing committees was revived in 1930, 1933 and 1936, and throughout the war years, criticism continued that large sums of money were being spent annually with very little detailed parliamentary scrutiny. (See, for example, Journals, February 15, 1933, p. 227; Debates, June 23, 1936, pp. 4123-6, and July 24, 1943, pp. 5382-6; Journals, March 3, 1944, pp. 146-52; April 10, 1946, pp. 125-6; December 5, 1947, pp. 13-17.)
[110]: Journals, February 8, 1955, pp. 127-8.
[111]: Journals, May 30, 1958, p. 71.
[112]: Journals, April 26, 1967, pp. 1769-74. These temporary changes reflected a consensus with regard to the various House decisions and recommendations of procedure committees which had been tabled throughout the period 1964-67. See, for example, the Fifteenth Report of the Special Committee on Procedure and Organization, presented on December 14, 1964 (Journals, pp. 985-96); the Nineteenth Report of the Special Committee on Procedure and Organization, presented on March 26, 1965 (Journals, pp. 1176-7); and the motion concerning Supply proceedings adopted on June 8, 1965 (Journals, pp. 210-1).
[113]: For the purpose of the 30 days, the Business of Supply was defined as consisting of “main estimates; interim supply; and supplementary or additional estimates excepting supplementary or additional estimates introduced after the main estimates have been approved, and excepting always the final supplementary or additional estimates” (Journals, June 8, 1965, p. 210).
[114]: See Journals, December 6, 1968, pp. 429-31.
[115]: See Journals, December 20, 1968, pp. 554-73.
[116]: Standing Order 81(4). In March 1975, the House agreed to a provisional Standing Order permitting opposition Members, on allotted days, to select certain items in the Estimates to be considered in a Committee of the Whole. (See the Second Report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization, presented to the House on March 14, 1975 (Journals, pp. 372-6) and concurred in on March 24, 1975 (Journals, p. 399)) Although this procedure was followed on nine occasions over the next fifteen months, the provision lapsed at the end of the session and the experiment was not renewed. Study of specific items of the Main and Supplementary Estimates was carried out in a Committee of the Whole on May 9, 12, 13, 22, 28 and June 5 and 17, 1975, and on May 20 and 26, 1976.
[117]: Standing Order 81(1).
[118]: Standing Order 81(13). On one occasion, the House considered specific items in the Estimates on a Supply day. (See Speaker Lamoureux’s ruling, Journals, June 26, 1973, pp. 435-6.)
[119]: The question of what constitutes a lack of confidence in the government is of a political nature and not one the Speaker should decide. (See, for example, Speaker Lamoureux’s ruling, Journals, May 4, 1970, pp. 742-3. See also the ruling of Deputy Speaker Champagne, Debates, September 19, 1991, pp. 2374-6.) Many see the combination of the confidence convention and strong party discipline as a principal reason for the weak scrutiny of government expenditure currently exercised by the Canadian House of Commons. (See the Fifty-First Report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs (The Business of Supply: Completing the Circle of Control), and in particular Section IX, “The Confidence Convention and the Business of Supply”, presented to the House on December 10, 1998 (Journals, p. 1435). In its response to the Fifty-First Report, tabled on May 7, 1999 (Journals, p. 1839, Sessional Paper No. 8512-361-131), the government expressed the view that “the proposal to use confidence sparingly on supply matters would not be in keeping with our tradition and would be extremely difficult to implement”.)
[120]: See the Second Report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization, Journals, March 14, 1975, pp. 372 and 375, and March 24, 1975, p. 399. The House adopted the first opposition motion on an allotted day on February 12, 1976 (Journals, p. 1016, and Debates, p. 10883). At the time, the government found the wording of the motion acceptable (Debates, February 11, 1976, p. 10842).
[121]: Journals, June 27, 1985, pp. 910, 914-5 and 919. This change was recommended in the First Report of the Special Committee on the Reform of the House of Commons (McGrath Committee), presented to the House on December 20, 1984 (Journals, p. 211). The government had responded that it supported the proposal on the grounds that it provided an opportunity for the government and the Opposition to discuss and debate policy without the sometimes rigid restriction of the non-confidence motion (Debates, April 18, 1985, p. 3869). This amendment was made permanent two years later (Journals, June 3, 1987, pp. 1016 and 1023). On one occasion, a Member proposed a motion which specified that it was not to be considered a question of confidence in the government. A point of order having been raised, the Deputy Speaker declared that the determination of confidence in the government is not a question of procedure and therefore not an issue to be ruled on by the Speaker (Debates, September 19, 1991, pp. 2374-6).
[122]: Journals, February 6, 1986, pp. 1644 and 1655-6, and February 13, 1986, p. 1710. See Standing Order 81(4). This rule change was recommended in the Third Report of the Special Committee on the Reform of the House of Commons (McGrath Committee), June 1985, p. 20.
[123]: Journals, April 11, 1991, p. 2917.
[124]: Journals, April 11, 1991, p. 2917.
[125]: Journals, February 7, 1994, pp. 112 and 117.
[126]: Journals, June 12, 1998, pp. 1027-8. See, for example, Journals, June 8, 1999, pp. 2064-6.
[127]: See, for example, Journals, January 18, 1994, p. 17, and Debates, February 27, 1996, p. 6. There have been occasions where the traditional request for funds was not included in the Speech from the Throne: September 8, 1930; January 25, 1940; October 9, 1951; December 12, 1988; and April 3, 1989. On the latter occasion, a question of privilege was raised contending that, since the Crown had not requested Supply, the House had no obligation to consider it (Debates, April 6, 1989, p. 177). In his ruling, Speaker Fraser noted that the Standing Orders do not require that a request for funds be included in the Throne Speech and that its inclusion has been a matter of tradition, not procedural necessity (Debates, May 2, 1989, p. 1177).
[128]: Standing Order 81(1). See, for example, Journals, May 13, 1991, p. 13; January 18, 1994, p. 19; February 27, 1996, p. 4; September 23, 1997, p. 14.
[129]: On March 30, 1990, an allotted day, the House was adjourned for lack of quorum. At that time, the lack of quorum and the subsequent adjournment of the sitting superseded the Supply proceedings then underway (Debates, p. 10050). The continuing order for Supply was lost and removed from the Order Paper. Speaker Fraser subsequently ruled that losing the order for Supply did not nullify all of the House’s previous decisions respecting Supply. The order could be redesignated on a non-debatable motion proposed by a Minister of the Crown (Debates, April 3, 1990, pp. 10119-21). A motion to redesignate the continuing order for supply was moved and agreed to (see Journals, April 3, 1990, p. 1486). In 1991, the Standing Orders were amended so that loss of quorum no longer had the effect of superseding proceedings then before the House (Journals, April 11, 1991, p. 2910). For more information on quorum and superseded orders, see Chapter 9, “Sittings of the House”, and Chapter 12, “The Process of Debate”.
[130]: Standing Order 81(3).
[131]: Standing Order 81(2) and (10)(a).
[132]: Standing Order 81(3).
[133]: Standing Order 81(7) also permits standing committees of the House to consider projected departmental expenditures for future fiscal years. Although this was previously possible under the provisions of Standing Order 108(2), the general mandate of standing committees, Standing Order 81(7) explicitly includes consideration of future government spending plans under the Business of Supply.
[134]: Standing Order 81(10)(a). When the new Supply procedures were introduced in 1969, the rules provided for 25 allotted days: five in the period ending December 10, seven in the period ending March 26 and thirteen in the period ending June 30 (Journals, December 20, 1968, pp. 554 and 557). Effective June 8, 1987, the distribution was changed to six, nine and ten respectively (Journals, June 3, 1987, pp. 1016 and 1023). In 1991, the end date of the third period was changed to June 23 from June 30, the number of days was reduced from 25 to 20 and the distribution was changed to five, seven and eight, effective May 13, 1991 (Journals, April 11, 1991, pp. 2905-6, 2917 and 2931). The total number of days was increased to 21 to accommodate four opposition parties, seven to be allotted in each of the three periods, effective September 21, 1998 (Journals, June 12, 1998, p. 1028).
[135]: Standing Order changes approved in 1998 (Journals, June 12, 1998, pp. 1027-8) made provision to discuss an opposition motion on the last Supply day in the period ending June 23. Before this change, that day was set aside entirely for the consideration of a motion or motions to concur in the Main Estimates.
[136]: Standing Order 81(10)(b). See, for example, Journals, November 16, 1992, p. 2053, and February 27, 1996, p. 4.
[137]: Standing Order 81(10)(c). See, for example, Journals, September 16, 1992, p. 1999, and February 4, 1994, p. 107. The number of days the House sits is determined according to the parliamentary calendar set out under Standing Order 28(2).
[138]: Standing Order 81(11).
[139]: Standing Order 81(12).
[140]: See, for example, Journals, November 30, 1970, p. 164; Debates, November 30, 1970, p. 1598.
[141]: See, for example, Journals, March 14, 1975, p. 376; June 17, 1975, p. 641; April 30, 1993, p. 2884; September 23, 1997, p. 14.
[142]: See, for example, Journals, June 2, 1971, p. 600; December 4, 1975, p. 911. See also Debates, March 14, 1975, p. 4115; June 17, 1975, p. 6829.
[143]: Journals, June 3, 1991, p. 132.
[144]: See, for example, Debates, October 26, 1983, p. 28349. Supply days have been designated by a Minister rising on a point of order (see, for example, Debates, October 15, 1990, p. 14165; September 21, 1998, p. 8189). On one occasion, the House agreed to consider the Business of Supply although the day had not been designated previously (see Debates, May 28, 1987, p. 6467).
[145]: See, for example, Debates, May 28, 1998, p. 7362; October 1, 1998, p. 8656. In the “Thursday Statement”, the Government House Leader rises in response to a question from the House Leader of the Official Opposition to advise the House of the business the government intends to call over the following week. (See also Chapter 10, “The Daily Program”.)
[146]: See ruling of Speaker Sauvé, Debates, February 11, 1982, pp. 14899-900; ruling of Deputy Speaker Francis, October 27, 1983, p. 28375. See also ruling of Speaker Fraser, Debates, March 26, 1990, p. 9759.
[147]: See ruling of Speaker Fraser, Debates, March 22, 1990, p. 9628.
[148]: See ruling of Speaker Fraser, Debates, December 4, 1986, pp. 1811-2.
[149]: See, for example, ruling of Speaker Fraser, Debates, April 3, 1990, pp. 10119-20.
[150]: Standing Order 81(15).