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View Wayne Easter Profile
Lib. (PE)
View Wayne Easter Profile
2021-04-01 14:33
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I call the meeting to order.
Welcome to meeting number 32 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance. Pursuant to the committee's motion adopted on Friday, February 5, 2021, the committee is meeting to study all aspects of COVID-19 spending and programs.
Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the House order of January 25, and therefore members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application. Proceedings will be made available via the House of Commons website.
Just so that witnesses are aware—members certainly are already aware—the webcast will always show the person speaking rather than the entirety of the committee.
I would remind folks to try to keep their mike off when they're not speaking.
Witnesses, if you want to add a comment to somebody's question, even if it's directed elsewhere, just raise your hand and I'll try to catch you. If I miss you, you'll have to put your mike on and yell.
With that, we do have a couple of orders of business. I'll split them and do one with this panel and one with the other before we go to witnesses.
The order of business that we must deal with is the budget for the Bill C-14 hearings we already completed. The request for the project budget, just to name it, is Bill C-14, an act to implement certain provisions of the economic statement tabled in Parliament on November 30, 2020 and other measures, and the amount requested is $5,025.
Does somebody want to move that motion?
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View Wayne Easter Profile
Lib. (PE)
View Wayne Easter Profile
2021-03-23 16:00
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We will call the meeting to order.
Welcome to meeting 29 of the Standing Committee on Finance.
Pursuant to the order of reference of March 8, 2021, the committee is meeting to start the clause-by-clause study of Bill C-14, an act to implement certain provisions of the economic statement tabled in Parliament on November 30, 2020 and other measures.
Today's meeting is taking place in hybrid format, pursuant to the House order of January 25, therefore members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application. The proceedings will be made available via the House of Commons website. The webcast covers only the person who is speaking, rather than the committee as a whole.
With that, I first of all want to thank all the witnesses for coming to assist us in the clause-by-clause study.
We have witnesses here from the Department of Employment and Social Development, from the Department of Finance, from the Department of Health and from the Department of Western Economic Diversification.
With that, we will go to the clause-by-clause study of Bill C-14. Members, if you have any questions on any of these clauses as we're going through them, please raise them, and the appropriate witness from the various departments will answer.
(Clauses 2 to 5 inclusive agreed to on division)
(On clause 6)
The Chair: There's an amendment by the NDP. It's NDP-1, on clause 6.
Go ahead, Peter. You will want to move that.
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View Peter Julian Profile
NDP (BC)
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Yes, I move the amendment.
Members of the committee will recall that back on November 24, the House of Commons voted unanimously to call on the government to extend the moratorium on paying student loans. We currently have a moratorium on interest, but not on the actual payment of student loans.
This amendment, with NDP-2 and NDP-3, would amend the legislation so that the loan repayment moratorium is extended. This is what the House called for—all of us did—on November 24.
We know that students are going through a profound financial crisis in terms of continuing to try to maintain their studies, but also that trying to get work to pay for those studies is often difficult. The supports are not in place. That's why, on November 24, all members of the House of Commons voted to extend this moratorium.
It's the missing aspect of Bill C-14. It's something that simply needs to be corrected, I believe. When you look at the House motion and when you look at the situation students are finding themselves in, this is simply a way of correcting that oversight. The interest payment moratorium, of course, is welcome, but when students are having to pay back their loans at a time of great financial crisis in the midst of a pandemic, with the third wave coming, it makes sense for us to improve this legislation, so that's what I'm proposing.
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View Wayne Easter Profile
Lib. (PE)
View Wayne Easter Profile
2021-03-23 16:05
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Peter, I expect you're expecting this, but I will have to rule the amendment inadmissible because it requires a royal recommendation. I'll explain why.
Part 2 of Bill C-14 seeks to amend the Canada Student Loans Act to temporarily suspend interest and interest payments with respect to guaranteed student loans during the period that begins on April 1, 2021, and ends on March 31, 2022. The amendment attempts to suspend interest and interest payments by a borrower for an indeterminate period of time that begins on April 1, 2021. Therefore, expending the time, the government would assume the payment of interest to the lender, which would result in increasing payments from the consolidated revenue fund.
House of Commons Procedure and Practice, third edition, states on page 772:
Since an amendment may not infringe upon the financial initiative of the Crown, it is inadmissible if it imposes a charge on the public treasury, or if it extends the objects or purposes or relaxes the conditions and qualifications specified in the royal recommendation.
In my opinion, the amendment as proposed requires a royal recommendation, since it imposes a new charge on the treasury. Therefore, I rule the amendment inadmissible.
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View Peter Julian Profile
NDP (BC)
Thank you, Mr. Chair. You're absolutely right to say I did expect that, and I'll be challenging your ruling.
I would suggest that it's up to the committee, and opposition members may choose to override the ruling of the chair.
On that basis, I would suggest that the House of Commons motion that was adopted by all members on November 24 provided very clear guidelines as to where the government's legislation should have gone, so this oversight needs to be corrected. The government withholding a royal recommendation is a matter of political choice, and the government can choose to provide a royal recommendation if this committee overrides the chair's decision and includes that as part of the amended legislation that's brought forward to the House of Commons.
Because we're in a minority Parliament, members have the sovereign right to override a chair's decision. I think there is a solid basis on which to do that, given that we have had a House of Commons motion that was adopted by all members of Parliament, and this legislation, of course, should be amended so it reflects the clear will of members of the House of Commons from all parties on November 24.
I will challenge the chair on that basis.
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View Wayne Easter Profile
Lib. (PE)
View Wayne Easter Profile
2021-03-23 16:09
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All right.
Mr. Clerk, on the challenge to the chair's ruling, could you call the vote?
(Ruling of the chair sustained: yeas 9; nays 2)
(Clause 6 agreed to on division)
(On clause 7)
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View Wayne Easter Profile
Lib. (PE)
View Wayne Easter Profile
2021-03-23 16:09
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On clause 7, Peter, you have an amendment there as well. It's NDP-2. Do you want to move it?
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View Peter Julian Profile
NDP (BC)
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I have gotten a clear view of the committee's will, so I will add to my initial comments. For clause 6, amendments were to the Canada Student Loans Act. This is regarding amendments to the Canada Student Financial Assistance Act.
I would implore committee members to override the chair's ruling on royal recommendation and also vote in favour of this amendment, since students are now being forced to pay for student loans because the government has ignored the all-party resolution that was adopted unanimously on November 24.
Let's look at this picture. Students who are crippled by debt are trying to pay back their loans at the same time as they're often struggling to get their families through the pandemic and put food on the table. This is something that simply doesn't mesh, I think, with the fairness and equity we want to see in this country. That's why I'm proposing this amendment to the Canada Student Financial Assistance Act, to put in place that moratorium through the pandemic so that students are not paying back a government loan when they should be putting food on the table.
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View Wayne Easter Profile
Lib. (PE)
View Wayne Easter Profile
2021-03-23 16:12
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Thank you, Peter.
My ruling, as you would suspect, is the same as on NDP-1. I'll not go through the long explanation, other than to say that this amendment basically seeks to achieve the same goal as NDP-1, but in this case for the Canada Student Financial Assistance Act. It has the same issue concerning the requirement for a royal recommendation, because it would mean spending more money. Therefore, I rule the amendment inadmissible.
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View Peter Julian Profile
NDP (BC)
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
By the same measure, I will challenge your ruling. The House of Commons has clearly stated, where Liberals and Conservatives were a part of that motion being adopted unanimously, that students should not be forced to pay back their student loan in the midst of a pandemic, so I challenge your ruling with all the great respect I have for you as chair.
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View Wayne Easter Profile
Lib. (PE)
View Wayne Easter Profile
2021-03-23 16:13
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That is entirely your right.
We will go to the clerk for a vote on the chair's ruling.
(Ruling of the chair sustained: yeas 9; nays 2)
(Clause 7 agreed to on division)
(On clause 8)
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View Peter Julian Profile
NDP (BC)
Thanks very much, Mr. Chair.
This would amend the Apprentice Loans Act so that there is a loan repayment moratorium.
Mr. Chair, you'll recall that at the beginning of this pandemic, the government, with all-party support, put in place a moratorium on student debt payments. That moratorium ended, and now students are struggling and people in apprenticeship training programs are struggling to pay for their student loans at the same time as they're trying to put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads. There is a profound indication of unfairness to that.
In light of the November 24 motion adopted unanimously, which included apprenticeship loans, I would move this amendment, which would ensure that there's a moratorium for all those in apprenticeship programs across the country on having to repay their student loans during this pandemic.
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View Wayne Easter Profile
Lib. (PE)
View Wayne Easter Profile
2021-03-23 16:16
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Thank you, Mr. Julian. I will have to rule the same as I ruled on the previous NDP-1 and NDP-2. I know this relates to the Apprentice Loans Act, but it is the same issue concerning a requirement for a royal recommendation that can come only from the government or the ministry. Therefore, I rule the amendment inadmissible as well.
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View Peter Julian Profile
NDP (BC)
With respect, Mr. Chair, I will challenge that ruling. We need apprenticeship training. We need the apprenticeship programs across the country to continue. It's very difficult when people are trying to pay back their loans at the same time as they are trying to get through their programs and trying to put food on the table. Again, this is very much in opposition to what was adopted by all-party agreement on November 24, calling on the government to extend the moratorium on student loan payments.
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