NDVA Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON NATIONAL DEFENCE AND VETERANS AFFAIRS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA DÉFENSE NATIONALE ET DES ANCIENS COMBATTANTS

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Tuesday, February 22, 2000

• 1528

[English]

The Chair (Mr. Pat O'Brien (London—Fanshawe, Lib.)): I call to order the meeting of the Standing Committee on National Defence and Veterans Affairs.

Colleagues, there are no witnesses today. There are four items to deal with. You see them there on the agenda. We'll walk through them, and then if anyone else has anything else they'd like to raise, this would be a good time to do that, and we'll probably still be out of here earlier than our normal quitting time, I imagine.

An hon. member: We won't be out of the House early.

The Chair: No, we won't be out of the House early, so you might want to go for a rest.

The first item is the matter raised a few meetings back by Mr. O'Reilly relating to correspondence to me by the Auditor General. At his request, I had the information circulated through the clerk to you and now I'm going to turn it over to John O'Reilly, who asked that this matter come to committee's attention.

Mr. O'Reilly.

Mr. John O'Reilly (Haliburton—Victoria—Brock, Lib.): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I don't want to indulge too much of the committee's time, but we have something before us that is unprecedented.

I don't believe it to be a matter of restriction of privileges, but the Auditor General is an employee of the House of Commons, and I would worry that the Auditor General writing to the chair of a committee, particularly this committee, basically restricting the type of questions or the ability for anyone on this committee to draw from witnesses their credentials or their purpose, or their credibility or their expertise, is something we have to look at. I've tried to find some case law that would indicate exactly whether the rights of members would be infringed by this or whether in fact the Auditor General overstepped his authority.

• 1530

So I was looking more for this committee to decide if in fact there was a prima facie case of privilege, or restriction of privilege, or whether in fact it's a matter of the matter being dropped. Or is it something that we should send back to the House for direction?

In particular, I think the opposition members should be more concerned about this letter than I am.

As the Auditor General is an employee of the House of Commons, if I were in the opposition and I were restricted from asking questions of witnesses, I think I would be feeling muzzled by the government and it would cause quite an uproar.

It's something I haven't been able to put a handle on. I have about 10 legal opinions, all of which have said they felt that the Auditor General was out of bounds by sending that letter.

So it's not a matter for the House of Commons at this point in time, it's a matter for this committee. And I don't have a clear direction under which I would want to take it personally. I asked that the minutes be circulated so that everyone would have the opportunity to read them to decide in fact if I overstepped the authority of this committee in calling into question the credentials of a witness.

We've all witnessed in this committee the appearance of retired generals who appear to all of a sudden have a conscience, usually at the deliverance of the first pension cheque. We've watched them explain why they haven't been able to do things when it was their watch and now they know how to fix everything. I think we've questioned them fairly hard on that.

I didn't feel I was creating any kind of a personal attack. I don't have any personal feelings towards the witness. I want to go back to what I said.

I indicated that I want to go back to a couple of things that were said to make sure I got them straight. That basically led into the questioning. I know you have that in front of you, so you can interpret it for yourself. But I didn't think they were extremely hard or difficult questions I was asking. I wouldn't expect that if a member of the opposition asked the same thing of a government witness or of a department witness, they should be called on the carpet for that.

So two things come to mind. One is that there is a problem, that I have hit a hot button. Then there's a response there, or maybe DND are keeping something back from the Auditor General that they can't get at. I don't know which it is or whether it's either of those, but I feel I've been centred out for something I didn't think was anything other than a normal course of questioning.

As I said, and I'll repeat, I would be more concerned if the letter had been written to one of the opposition members. What would your reaction be is what I want to know.

I'll end with that, Mr. Chairman, and seek your advice.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly.

Everybody recalls the situation. If you don't, I'll quickly remind you. Shortly before Christmas, the Auditor General wrote me indicating there had been some pretty aggressive questioning by Mr. O'Reilly and hoping that the matter could end or something like that. You all have the letter. I'm working from memory. I wrote him back and said there's no doubt there were some aggressive questions from Mr. O'Reilly, as there often are at this committee and other committees we've all sat on.

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I, as chair, felt then, and I still felt after reflecting on it a few weeks later, that it didn't require my intervention. It wasn't what you'd call an ad hominem attack, where you're solely after the person as an individual. It was probing his expertise. It was probing the way he did his report. I stood on that. I told the Auditor General I look forward to seeing him again at committee, where he'd probably get some very aggressive questions from both sides of the table, and have a nice day. That's about it.

Mr. O'Reilly has brought the matter to the committee. So I'll throw it open. With your agreement, since we don't have witnesses and we're just among ourselves, if there's no objection, I'm not going to go with the party questioning rule. I'll just throw it open to anybody who wants to ask a question, unless there's an objection to that.

Mr. Hart.

Mr. Jim Hart (Okanagan—Coquihalla, Ref.): Maybe we could get a review of it exactly. Maybe it would be wise to send some information back to the Auditor General about the function of a committee, because I don't find any problem with the questioning that was undertaken by Mr. O'Reilly. In fact I think it's our role to probe for questions.

Maybe the Auditor General doesn't understand our role here. Quite frankly, as far as I know, we have the right to subpoena witnesses and we have the right to aggressively question a witness to get the answers the committee is trying to get to. So I think maybe another letter should be sent off to the Auditor General clearly outlining the role of the committee and the powers we actually have in questioning our witnesses.

Nobody wants to be rude to a witness. I don't think anybody on either side of the table wants to do that. But we do have an obligation by the taxpayers to probe and ask questions.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Hart.

Monsieur Bertrand.

Mr. Robert Bertrand (Pontiac—Gatineau—Labelle, Lib.): Merci, monsieur le président.

I think it goes a little deeper than what Jim was mentioning here. I think there's a legal aspect to the letter that was sent to you, Mr. Chair. Was it intimidation by the Auditor General in a convoluted way? I don't know. Jim was mentioning maybe sending a letter. I'm all for that, but I also think we should pursue the other avenue. The Auditor General is an employee of the House of Commons. I think this should be referred to committee. I forget which committee it is that takes care of this in the House of Commons. But I definitely think this should be referred to—which committee?

A voice: Procedures.

Mr. Robert Bertrand: The procedures committee. I think this should definitely be sent, because he might have done it to a few other committees also and they didn't think it was important enough to send to that committee. So I think, Mr. Chair, this should be investigated a little further.

The Chair: Thank you.

I have a clarification on Bob's point and then I'll go to Mr. Laurin. I'll come back to you, Jim.

Apparently, the clerk tells me, we don't have the authority to refer something to another committee directly. We have to report it to the House. Then if the House wants to kick it over to them, that's how it goes. So we could write a letter. You could tell me as chairman to make a report in the House of Commons that this matter was dealt with and now there's a request from this committee that it be explored further through the proper channels, something like that.

Bob.

Mr. Robert Bertrand: It's a question of privilege.

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Robert Bertrand: It's a question of privilege, his privileges—

The Chair: Yes, whatever way it is. Let's get out all the facts, and then we'll come to a course of action.

I have Monsieur Laurin and then Mr. Earle.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin (Joliette, BQ): Mr. Chairman, I did not look at this in the same way. Moreover, when I was a member of the public accounts committee, I often questioned the Auditor General and sometimes criticized him for not coming down hard enough regarding some government actions and operations. He might have believed that I was questioning his credibility or his impartiality, but he did not do so at that time.

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Why this time, owing to certain questions asked by our colleague, did he feel like his back was against the wall? It is a matter of perception, and he felt he needed to explain the situation. He had the right to take things that way, but that does not mean that committee members do not have the right to continue to ask aggressive questions and to tell witnesses that members have every right to question them. He reacted in this way and he told us so in a letter.

Mr. Chairman, I think that your letter was very well written. You answered him appropriately. I do not think there is any reason to go further with this, because if we respond with another letter, some people might get the impression that the committee is trying to intimidate the Auditor General by telling him to be very careful because the committee can go before the House to appeal his decision.

We do not want an on-going war between the Auditor General and the committee. I think that the two parties have explained their respective positions. If we want to continue to question our witnesses, including the Auditor General, in a fairly aggressive way—Mr. O'Reilly did so—I think that we must continue to do that. If that does not suit the Auditor General, he will write to us again. I do not think that we should get into debates over this or make it into a big issue. Personally, I would put this behind us and continue as we did before.

[English]

The Chair: Before I go to Mr. Earle, I just want to clarify how this transpired. The Auditor General wrote me, I think he felt, in defence of an employee. He felt the employee was being too aggressively questioned. You know that. So I answered as chair.

The member whose conduct was being questioned has put it on the floor of this committee, which is his right. Now the committee, as we see here with the discussion, is seized with this issue. If the committee decides to do nothing, that's fine, but now that it's come to the committee, it's gone further than just my letter back to the Auditor General.

Mr. Earle.

Mr. Gordon Earle (Halifax West, NDP): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Unfortunately, I just read the correspondence today—it's probably in my office somewhere—but I'm inclined to agree with Monsieur Laurin. It seems to me there was correspondence to you, you wrote back, and just from looking at it, it seems to have been a good response. Unless something further has come back from the Auditor General objecting to what you said or anything different, my feeling is that the point has been made, and you just watch from here on in how the Auditor General and his staff conduct themselves in the face of aggressive questioning in the future. If it becomes a problem, then deal with it.

I can understand, perhaps, the honourable member feeling he may have been slighted in some way by the Auditor General writing to you, but you wrote back in defence of the member and put forth a good position. To carry it further seems like we're almost looking for a fight. If the Auditor General has come back in response to your letter with something that requires further clarification, maybe there's need to take action. Otherwise, it seems to be a dead issue at this point.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Earle. I can report to you that there hasn't been any further communication at all to me about this matter from the Auditor General.

We have a couple of themes here. Some members on this side are saying to drop the matter, some are saying we should pursue it a little bit, and other members are saying we should definitely pursue it. Does anybody else want to share some ideas?

Mr. Clouthier.

Mr. Hec Clouthier (Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, Lib.): I think there's nothing more. Basically, I believe the Auditor General tried to rebuke Mr. O'Reilly because he felt that one of his employees was being slighted. I think it was more a case of the boss trying to stand up for an employee.

Having said that, I don't believe he had the right or the jurisdiction to send that letter, because in my estimation it definitely was an intimidation tactic. He has a job to do, but let's face it, on occasion they can get on their high horses and think they shouldn't be questioned about anything.

I was there that particular day. I've often heard Mr. O'Reilly ask more pointed and difficult questions than that. I'm on the public accounts committee with René, and I know he sometimes gets excoriated for some of the things he does. But the Auditor General has never reacted in that type of fashion before. Mr. O'Reilly, on occasion, has a unique way of getting under people's skins, and that's why we're here on the committee.

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An hon. member: It's like a hockey team.

Mr. Hec Clouthier: We're here to question the witnesses we have, and if we believe something is not being done properly, it is our right as members of Parliament to do so. I was there and I didn't see anything wrong with his line of questioning. Further to that, Mr. Chair, in every committee I'm on, if the chairperson decides that a question is an ad hominem attack or that it's out of order, that chair will rule it out of order.

I don't know what his intent was other than perhaps to try to defend.... I don't know if his employee went to him afterwards. You try to figure out what went on in people's minds. Maybe he felt Mr. O'Reilly had been unduly harsh with him and perhaps the Auditor General said “Well, I'll give him a slap on the wrist. I'll straighten it out.” In my estimation, that letter to this committee was completely uncalled for.

The Chair: I'll share with my colleagues that I felt a mild bit of offence at the fact that there was an implication of the member, and it would be the same on either side. I hope my colleagues on this side believe I would defend their right to ask tough questions, the same as I did for this member.

I think there was a little bit of an implication that maybe I had let a member be out of order. I totally reject that. A few weeks later, when I got this letter, obviously a couple of weeks after the meeting, I still felt I did not need to bring the member to order. He was just being aggressive, as we all are sometimes, but he was not in contravention of the rules.

Anyhow, we're starting to get a few more thoughts. We'll get a few more thoughts from Mr. Hart and then Mr. Laurin, and maybe we can make a decision on what to do.

Mr. Jim Hart: My reading of the Auditor General's letter is that he is trying to clarify the employment situation. That was the question where I think they felt obliged to come back on Mr. O'Reilly, because apparently he had asked the question before. It wasn't the first time. There are two instances noted here. In one way the Auditor General is clarifying and hoping to put to rest the issue of the two-year employment situation.

I think we should send a letter. It appears to me that the Auditor General doesn't understand the powers of the committee. I'm sure he does in the back of his mind, but he wanted to stand up and defend his employee. That's fine. But Mr. O'Reilly is offended by this letter, and I think I'd be offended too. I don't see anything other than a clarification. If Mr. O'Reilly wants to put forward a point of privilege in the House of Commons, I think that's also a valid thing to do. He can let the House decide, and then it could go to the procedure and House affairs committee.

I don't think it would be right for this committee to make a report, issue it to the House of Commons, and start a debate on this issue. That's taking it over the top. If Mr. O'Reilly feels his personal privileges have been infringed upon, then like any other member of the House, with an hour's notice to the Speaker, he can lay a point of privilege.

Mr. John O'Reilly: Mr. Chairman, the committee is subject to its own rules. If my privileges are impugned in the House, then I can bring it up in the House. If it's in committee, the committee has to report it to the House before I can raise it as a point of privilege. I can't raise it in the House as a point of privilege at this point in time.

The Chair: You're sure about that process?

Mr. John O'Reilly: Yes, I've asked about it. In order for it to be raised in the House, it has to be referred back to the House.

The Chair: Okay, thank you.

[Translation]

Mr. Laurin, please.

Mr. René Laurin: I think that there is no reason to doubt that the Auditor General is very well aware of the prerogatives of all members of the committee. The Auditor General is not a neophyte. He has nine years of experience in his position and has dealt with all the committees. I think that he is very familiar with the committee rules and members' powers.

I am going only by the letters, Mr. Chairman. I do not know if I was there when this questioning took place, because I was away for one week. If I was there, the incident did not seem out of the ordinary to me. That is why I am going only by the content of the letters. In the Auditor General's letter, I see no indication that he is denying the member's privilege to ask these questions. I see no indication that he is criticizing the member for having asked these questions. The Auditor General perhaps felt that the competence or expertise of one of his employees had been called into question, and he felt the need to set the facts straight in a letter saying that he had no doubts at all as to his employee's competence. He did not say that the member had no right to ask those questions in that tone. While he may have mentioned the tone that was used, he did not criticize the member for having acted in that way.

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Given that there was no criticism, I do not see how the privileges... If it were me, I would have reacted in the same way. I would have found it very serious, Mr. Chairman, if you had not responded to the Auditor General's letter, but given that he is not challenging in any way members' rights and the tone that members should use in committee meetings, and since you responded adequately to his letter, I do not believe that it would be appropriate to go further with this. If the member wants to do so personally, he has the right to appeal to the Speaker of the House, but I believe that in doing so he would just strain relations between the Auditor General and the committee members.

As for Mr. O'Reilly, I would advise him to continue to act in exactly the same way, as I would as well, even if the Auditor General writes again to make clarifications concerning testimony. I consider this to be nothing out of the ordinary. When I had people reporting to me and they were criticized, my first reflex was to defend their integrity and competence when it seemed to me that they had been called into question. Although Mr. O'Reilly had no intention of calling into question this person's competence, that might have been the perception. The Auditor General made a clarification, Mr. Chairman, and you have responded to him. I believe that the matter is closed.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Proud.

Mr. George Proud (Hillsborough, Lib.): I don't have anything.

The Chair: Anybody else? Mrs. Wayne.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne (Saint John, PC): Mr. Chairman, as I read your letter of reply to the Auditor General, it more or less states your position, but it is the position of most of us on the board as well. I think the reason we received the letter from the Auditor General is basically that his employee went running back to the Auditor General, upset that anyone questioned him whatsoever about the fact that he was a former employee of National Defence, and all of a sudden he was.... That's all.

I think you've covered it and done it extremely well. If the Auditor General didn't feel that you had, then we certainly would have heard back from him by now.

The Chair: Thank you, Mrs. Wayne.

Colleagues, I think there are three options from this discussion. We could let the matter rest and consider it closed as a committee, leaving it to Mr. O'Reilly to pursue individually whatever he might want to pursue. As has been suggested by a couple of members, we could write to the Auditor General. I, on behalf of the committee, could write to the Auditor General saying the letters have been discussed at committee and the committee endorses the chairman's response to your letter that everything was fine and in order. The committee could do that and let it rest there, or the committee could do that and also report to the House, or the committee could just report to the House. So we have about four options.

It's an important matter. I want a motion from somebody that we take whatever action you think is appropriate, and then we'll discuss it and we'll vote.

Mr. Hart.

Mr. Jim Hart: I think that motion should come from Mr. O'Reilly, because he's the person who's bringing the issue forward.

The Chair: Give him first chance.

Mr. Jim Hart: Yes, give him first chance to make the motion.

The Chair: Okay. We'll give Mr. O'Reilly the first chance to put a motion on what the committee should do, and then we'll have discussion on it.

Mr. O'Reilly.

Mr. John O'Reilly: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I'm prepared to move that we report it back to the House and let it be dealt with in the House.

I do that with the thought that this committee should deal with these kinds of things seriously—and not just because it's me. I'm sure if it were Mr. Earle or Mrs. Wayne who'd had this letter written about them, they'd be screaming bloody murder, and I would be supporting them, because I think we as a committee have to remain able to question as hard as we can the people who are appearing before us. We have people here who live in school buses who are telling us they're experts of some kind, and we question them to find out if they are or not.

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Mr. Laurin, I thought you asked harder questions than I did at that meeting. You were the lead guy in the questioning, so I was surprised he didn't complain about you.

I'm sorry the clerk didn't send everyone a copy of the minutes of the meeting. I took them off the Internet, and I had asked that they be circulated. But I think if you read them, you'd see there were some hard questions asked, and not just by me. I'm just the one who got centred out.

The Chair: Do you want—

Mr. John O'Reilly: I'd move that we—

An hon. member: Do you need a seconder for that motion?

The Chair: Not in committee, I guess.

Just before I ask you to frame that motion, Mr. O'Reilly, I'll say that the committee could write to the Auditor General endorsing my letter if it wants to, or it could say to forget that letter and just have the chairman take it to the House. Or it could do both things. It can write to the Auditor General and it can tell me to report this discussion to the House.

What motion do you want to make?

Mr. John O'Reilly: I think you should do both. You should put the Auditor General on notice that you have dealt with it and that you're reporting it back to the House.

The Chair: So you're moving that the committee instruct the chairman to write a letter to the Auditor General saying that the committee endorses my letter to him of January 18, after deliberation of the matter at committee; and that I also, as chairman, be told to report this matter to the House. Is that the motion?

Mr. John O'Reilly: Yes.

The Chair: Is there discussion of that motion? Monsieur Laurin, and then Mr. Hart.

Mr. Jim Hart: On Mr. O'Reilly's point that Mr. Laurin had tougher questions, to me that almost indicates that the Auditor General was really just trying to clarify the employee situation. In his second paragraph, he talks about the policy of the government and the time that had elapsed with Mr. Kasurak's employment with the Auditor General's department. It doesn't indicate to me that he was offended by the tough questioning that was coming from either side of the table. He did want to clarify that one particular issue, because it had been raised before by you on March 4.

I'd like to see tough questioning in this forum, but I just think taking it to the House and reporting on it is unnecessary. On second consideration, maybe the letter the chairman has written is enough. I think we should just get on with business and finish our report on procurement.

The Chair: I'll come back to you, Jim.

[Translation]

Mr. Laurin.

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, I would like the motion to be divided because we are talking about two different things. I would be prepared to support the first part, which says that the committee endorsed the chairman's letter. However, I do not agree with the second part, which states that the matter should go before the House of Commons. I would like to have a separate vote on each part of the motion.

[English]

The Chair: That's a very good point. We need two motions. We have to separate the two themes, anyway.

Mr. John O'Reilly: I don't have a problem with that.

The Chair: Okay, we have a friendly agreement to have two motions. The first is that the committee instruct me to write a letter indicating its support of my previous letter to the Auditor General and that the matter is closed as far as the committee is concerned. The second action, which we'll vote on separately, would be whether or not to have me report that and the gist of this discussion to the House.

Mr. O'Reilly.

Mr. John O'Reilly: Mr. Chairman, just to let the committee know—and I believe the clerk can verify this—I cannot report or talk about this in the House unless it's reported to the House.

The Chair: That's correct.

Mr. John O'Reilly: If I indeed have a prima facie case of conflict of my privileges, I cannot report it unless it comes out of this committee and into the House. That's what I'm asking for.

The Chair: Can I get the clerk to give his expertise on that point, just so members are clear on this?

The Clerk of the Committee (Mr. Eugene Morawski): The committee can't rule on privilege. It's the Speaker who rules on privilege. To take an action on privilege, we'd have to report that action to the Speaker so that he could decide whether or not there is a prima facie case and then refer it to a committee.

The Chair: So is the member correct that he cannot individually raise this matter in the House unless the committee—

The Clerk: He could if he wanted to, but the Speaker would say it's a matter that should be dealt with in committee, so he'd just send it right back.

• 1600

The Chair: Oh, I see.

I guess the concern I'm hearing from Mr. O'Reilly is that if he wants to raise this, he has no opportunity to raise this as a point of privilege in the House unless we give him that opportunity by doing a report to the House. Is that correct?

A voice: Yes.

The Chair: We'll take a bit more discussion, then, because we have some other items and I think we have to make a decision.

Mr. Earle.

Mr. Gordon Earle: The question I would have is how Mr. O'Reilly's privilege has in fact been breached. I could see it if you had come back and reprimanded him and said to not ask those kinds of questions. I would see then that his privilege has been breached by this action of the Auditor General writing to you, but it seems to me that you came back and said quite clearly in your letter that aggressive questioning will occur from time to time, and they say to have a good day, and that kind of thing.

I can't see where he is now prevented from asking those kinds of questions at future sessions with the Auditor General or his staff. I'm at a bit of a loss to understand why there would be a breach of privilege that this committee would report to the House. I can fully support the idea of a committee letter reinforcing your letter, but going further than that just seems to me to be making more of it that what it really is.

I can understand your feeling sensitive about it, Mr. O'Reilly, but I can't see where your privilege has actually been breached. I just don't see that.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Mr. Chair, may I?

The Chair: Yes, maybe we'll hear from Mrs. Wayne, and then we'll give Mr. O'Reilly a chance to react to that. I then want to take some final thoughts and I want to vote on this matter.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Mr. Chairman, I think that if you write a letter, as the chairperson, saying that all members of this committee support Mr. O'Reilly and the fact that he has the right to ask questions as he sees fit, that in the future we will continue to support him, and that aggressive questions will be asked, we will all sign it. If you want us all to sign it, we can all put our signatures on it.

John, I really think that if you get the full support like that from all of us, that should be the end of it for now. Then, if anything ever happens as before, we'll all be there to support you to go further.

The Chair: Okay, thanks very much.

Mr. O'Reilly, I'm going to come back to you as the last speaker, since I don't see others. I then want to make a decision.

Mr. John O'Reilly: The bottom line on this, Mr. Chair, is that I felt intimidated by it. I haven't asked a question in this committee since that letter was brought to my attention, because I felt my privileges were breached. I feel that if you or Mr. Earle were sent a letter like that, you would feel intimidated and would question yourself as to whether....

I went back over the question—

The Chair: Can you imagine anyone intimidating Elsie Wayne?

Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

Mr. John O'Reilly: No, but I couldn't imagine anybody intimidating me—

The Chair: I know.

Mr. John O'Reilly: —and now I have some doubts. That's why I brought it to the committee.

Put yourselves in my shoes. Take a look at that letter. What if it was written to you as a member of the opposition? Would you not feel intimidated? Would you not get your back up? I think you would. So I did. I got upset by it, I got intimidated by it, and I haven't asked questions in committee since. Until it's cleared up, I'm not sure that I will.

Again, that's why I brought it to the committee, and I can't deal with it unless you report it back to the House. But if you feel you can't report it back to the House, that it's not a big deal, then I'll accept that. I'm a big boy.

The Chair: All right, we're going to find out how the committee does feel right now, because I want to call the vote.

I want to call the vote on the first motion by Mr. O'Reilly that the committee instruct me as chair to write to the Auditor General, indicating that this matter has been discussed at committee, that the two previous letters have been discussed at committee, and that the committee fully endorses my previous response to the Auditor General, and that we consider the matter finished.

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: Turning to the idea that the committee would instruct me as chair to report the essence of this discussion and the fact that I had written to the Auditor General the letter that we just agreed I will write, how many think I should report this to the House? Five. Those opposed? Five.

I have to break the tie, although I don't like to have to do that. I'm going to vote with the member, simply because of my concern here. I've been twenty years in politics, and some of you have been here longer than me, and when I hear anybody in elected office say they take something as an attempt to intimidate them, then I'm going to give them that benefit. Seeing the vote and having to cast the tie-breaking vote, I'm going to give the benefit of the doubt on that side of it. My vote would be in favour, which would make it carry, six to five, if I counted correctly.

• 1605

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: So I will do that report to the House. I'll make it as succinct, as brief, as possible. Honestly, gentlemen, I don't like to be put in that position, but I am, and I would err on the side of.... I'd like to think I would do the same if it were a tie vote and a member on this side who felt that they'd been.... I don't like that word “intimidated”; if a member feels there's an attempt to intimidate him or her, I have a concern too.

Anyway, those are the two decisions. So we've taken our action, but we'll—

[Translation]

Mr. Laurin.

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, I do not want to call into question your decision, because I feel that you were right in giving your support in the way you have. However, given the circumstances, I wonder what value this will have in the eyes of the Speaker of the House, when he finds out that the request before him came out of a tied vote with five for and five against and the Chairman casting the deciding vote. It is obvious that the situation is not perceived the same way by those who voted in favour and those who voted against. It is simply a matter of perception.

Mr. O'Reilly was saying that you would not have liked to have a letter like that written about you. Personally, I am of the opposite view. I would have liked that, because it would have stimulated me even more. I would have said to myself that the next time he appeared, my questions would be even more pointed because I would have been within my right to do that.

I wonder. Given that the vote was so close, is it appropriate to send this matter to the House after all? The vote was taken and the motion was passed by a majority. I believe in a majority of 50% plus one, Mr. Chairman. I think that that is valid, but it is Mr. O'Reilly's decision.

[English]

The Chair: Don't go there!

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: You have decided that it should be sent anyway. Well, we are doing that because the decision was made by the majority, but I wonder what weight it will have in the eyes of the Speaker of the House, given that the vote was so close.

[English]

The Chair: That's a point well taken. I don't know. I guess we'll find out. I do know that we've made two decisions. We made the first one unanimously, and I'll write the letter. We made the other one on a narrow vote, and I'll do the report. It can be interpreted however it's going to be interpreted, I guess. I just wanted to explain my vote so that you all understand why I voted that way.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Mr. Chairman, I know that Bob voted against taking it—

Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: —but I thought there were a couple of others.

The Chair: Do you want me to take the vote again?

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: I'm pretty sure that last vote—

The Chair: I think there was an abstention.

Mr. Bob Wood (Nipissing, Lib.): I'm with O'Reilly.

An hon. member: Judi abstained.

Mrs. Judi Longfield (Whitby—Ajax, Lib.): I did not cast a vote. I have not seen enough to be able to vote, so I abstained.

The Chair: So it was six to five, with one abstention, okay?

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Yes, okay.

The Chair: All right.

Thank you very much, colleagues. That's the first matter.

So, Mr. O'Reilly, that's what will take place.

The second point of business is the idea of adopting a travel budget in regard to Charlottetown and Cornwallis.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman.

I thought that the first item on the agenda was future business, which has already been discussed by the steering committee. I was unfortunately not there. What are we doing about the suggestions that were made by the steering committee? In my opinion, they should be presented to the committee.

[English]

The Chair: Yes, we're going to go to that. That would be the fifth. We'll come to the report of the steering committee. You were unable to attend that, but at the end of these other matters we'll come to our report on what the steering committee discussed. We're going to discuss future business and make some final decisions in just a moment.

On the second item—I'm just following the printed agenda that came out earlier—there's a request or an opportunity to go to Charlottetown and visit DVA there and also an invitation from Jean-Jacques Blais to go to Cornwallis and visit the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre. The week that we are away from Ottawa is the week of March 6.

The clerk has prepared a budget in case we were to get approval of that trip. I don't want to put any colleague on the spot, but let's talk realistically here. I don't sense that the tone of the House right now is that we're going to get approval for trips. All it took was a simple clubbing over the head for me to figure this out.

• 1610

Can I ask the opposition members if they think they would get approval of this trip if we tried to put it forward?

Mr. Hart, do you think Reform would support it?

Mr. Jim Hart: We never have problems with Reform.

The Chair: Monsieur Laurin, do you think we would get approval or should we bother to try?

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask you a question before deciding on whether this should be approved or not.

What are the objectives of this trip to Charlottetown and Cornwallis? Is it simply a junket? What are the objectives of this trip?

[English]

The Chair: No, no. That's a fair question, but you know that when we went to Germany it was interesting to see Germany but it was a damn busy trip. As for this, I love Prince Edward Island, but I'd rather visit it in the spring. It's still pretty cold there at this type of year. That's what my friend Mr. Proud tells me.

It's a serious trip. We're SCONDVA. Veterans Affairs comes to this committee, as we all know very well with some of the issues we've dealt with, yet I don't think most of the members of the committee have ever visited the Department of Veterans Affairs in Charlottetown and seen, on the ground, what they do and the work they do. It's a serious request and a long-standing request from the DVA people, through Bob Wood, the PS, to come and familiarize ourselves.

While we're there, it would be a good chance to take up, if we want,

[Translation]

Mr. Blais's invitation

[English]

to go to the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre, which is world renowned. It's in our own country, and most Canadians or MPs have probably never heard of it or had a chance to visit that facility.

René, if we went to Charlottetown and were in that region anyway, it would make sense to go to the other facility if we want. We're not talking about a big, fancy, expensive trip, but obviously it costs some money. It's a serious working trip for those who wish to go and are able to go in the week when the House is off. I don't want to waste our clerk's time to put forward a trip. If you're pretty sure it's not going to be supported in the House, then we have to wait until the mood changes in the House.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, I have read the budget that was prepared by the clerk. We are talking about approximately $53,000. It is not the amount that should be the deciding factor, in my opinion. I believe that Canada has the means to enable a committee to travel in order to obtain information about issues that it feels are important for its future decisions. When it is necessary to spend money for that purpose, it should be done because it is important for us to move ahead in our work and for our decisions to be as well informed as possible.

Mr. Chairman, the Bloc Québécois has asked the House to allow the legislative committee considering Bill C-20 to travel so that the House and the committee members can be made more aware of the arguments that Canadians and Quebeckers would like to put to the committee about whether Bill C-20 should be passed or not. The Liberal Party has refused to allow the committee to travel to hear witnesses. That is an extremely important issue, the most important issue that has ever come before the House concerning Quebeckers' future, and we have not been allowed to travel in order to hear the views of other Canadians and other Quebeckers.

Even if the trip that is being proposed today is important, in my view and my party's view, it is not more important than travelling to hear witnesses on Bill C-20 would have been. Therefore, Mr. Chairman, as the Bloc Québécois representative on this committee I cannot give approval for this trip.

[English]

The Chair: That's fine. I appreciate your....

[Translation]

We are being told no. Yes,

[English]

I understand. There's no point in putting it in if it's not going to get approved, so we'll hold this trip as a trip that would be good to do to sometime when we think it can be approved.

• 1615

Frankly, I have to say, as a chairman—and I don't direct this at René or any one party, because I've seen it happen with different parties and even different individual members—that I think our House rules are absolutely ridiculous. The staff goes to the effort to put together a trip; you can tell me as chairman—in fact, I would like to suggest that we should go on record as a committee on this, maybe today—to take this trip; you approve it here by majority vote; you take it to the budget committee of the House, where all parties are represented; they approve it; you take it to the House, and everybody but even one member can approve it. One member can kill the trip, even if maybe he wants to be on the trip. That's an absolutely ridiculous way to run the affairs of the House.

I can't make a motion from the chair, but, boy, I'd sure love a motion that we take a position that those rules are ridiculous.

But I respect what you're saying, Monsieur Laurin. Unless I hear a motion, we'll just pull this budget request back and hold it for another time.

Mr. O'Reilly.

Mr. John O'Reilly: I want to speak to this, Mr. Chairman, because I think....

Were you first, Elsie? Go ahead.

The Chair: I'm sorry, I didn't see you, Mrs. Wayne.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Really, I'm very much in favour of this, because I think it's very good for our committee to see both the Department of Veterans Affairs in P.E.I. and Cornwallis.

If you'll recall, Mr. Chairman, I said that if you came back we'd take you to the HMCS Brunswicker and it wouldn't cost you a bloody cent. You could have your meal there and we could get you out.

I think you have to see, with the cutbacks that have come to the reserves, with the cutbacks that have come to National Defence—as you know, 23% of our budget's cut—what these people are doing. You have to talk with these people. A lot of these people, the colonels, the majors, all of them, would be so happy just to sit down and have lunch with you and tell you about the role they've been playing. When you see it, then you know there is a need for us to be very vocal in favour of what we have.

I think it's most important for all of us to see that role, particularly in the maritime provinces. I really do. Some people have an image of us in the maritime provinces, but if you could really see the role they're playing in Cornwallis, what's happening over in Veterans Affairs, and what's happening in the Brunswicker and our armouries, I really and truly think it would turn around people's view of our area, and I'm all for it.

The Chair: Mr. O'Reilly.

Mr. John O'Reilly: Mr. Chairman, I move that you submit the budget to the appropriate authorities, the budget committee or whatever it is; that you ask them to deal with it in the House, in Committee of the Whole; and that when you proceed to Committee of the Whole to deal with it, the clerk takes the roll....

Is that not possible?

The Chair: No, that's not the procedure. If it was, we would.... The procedure is that it has to be submitted to the whole House, and that creates the problem I just spoke about.

But the committee could tell me.... Fine, we heard Mr. Laurin's comments, and we appreciate his—

Mr. Bob Wood: If you move a motion, can you not vote on it?

The Chair: What motion?

Mr. Bob Wood: A motion in the House. Can you not then vote on it, and the unanimous—

The Chair: No, these trips take unanimous consent of the House.

Mr. Bob Wood: Are you sure?

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Bob Wood: You're positive of that?

The Chair: Absolutely positive.

What the committee could do—and although I don't necessarily agree with what Mr. Laurin has said, I do respect his point of view—is tell me, okay, we're going to pass this trip today; you go ahead, Mr. Chairman, and take it through the hoops. Make them turn it down again, but at least the request is on record.

Then you could pass a motion today, if you wanted, that we write to the proper authorities around here and tell them what a ridiculous set of rules we think we have.

You have the floor, Mr. O'Reilly, and then I'm going to give it to Mr. Hart.

You can't do what you were suggesting.

Mr. John O'Reilly: I realize that, Mr. Chairman, but I wanted to go on record as saying that I had recommended to the House that they revise their rules so that any travel or anything that needs consent automatically goes to Committee of the Whole to be dealt with. That is before the committee and they're dealing with it right now. So I'm not.... I'm saying that this could happen.

The Chair: Okay. Do you want to move this?

Mr. John O'Reilly: I so move it.

• 1620

The Chair: There is a motion that this trip as presented by the clerk be approved here and be taken to the budget committee.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: I'll second it.

The Chair: Is there any discussion to that motion to approve this trip here, which does not approve the trip finally, and take this to the budget committee?

Mr. Earle, discussion?

Mr. Gordon Earle: While I appreciate what the committee is trying to do by this, I guess for me it presents a practical problem. Life doesn't stand still while one is hoping that something may take place. You know, you book appointments for the week and line up some things. If at the last minute all of a sudden it appears the trip is going to be possible, then you can't really cancel those other activities, or if you hold off, hoping the trip is going to be possible, then you end up not being able to plan your constituency work or whatever you do in that time off.

For me, then, if reality points to it not being approved, no matter what hoops we go through, then I'd have to say I'm just going to go ahead and plan my life as if that trip does not exist.

The Chair: Fair enough. Thank you.

Monsieur Laurin.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, I would first like to refute one of your arguments, that is, that our procedures in this respect are ridiculous. One of the few powers that opposition members have left is to be able to express themselves and have an opinion that actually has an impact. I remember other trips that did not take place because the Reform Party opposed them and refused to take part. That could happen perhaps with a Conservative or NDP member as well.

Since these trips are never proposed by the opposition, the governing party, which suggests the travel, is never opposed to it. Mr. Chairman, the opposition should fight to keep the few powers that it has.

Unanimity is important because when a committee travels, everyone needs the same information. If the information is so important that we cannot proceed without it there should obviously be unanimous support and no one should be opposing it. Mr. Chairman, you too have been in politics for a long time and you know very well that people sometimes feel the need to object to these things for other reasons. That is what has happened in my case today.

I'm wondering whether it would be possible to do as you are suggesting and have the resolution passed and sent to the committee. If unanimous consent is required, I do not see how a motion could be passed other than unanimously. It is the only way to proceed. There is only one way; there is not a majority way and a unanimous way. The proposal has been presented and, since there is no unanimous consent, it is rejected.

You could say that the motion has been defeated by the committee, but that we are appealing that decision at another level, that we are appealing the committee's decision to the House. I would accept such a proposal, but I'm opposed to having it said that the motion was passed by a majority vote. It seems to me that that makes no sense.

[English]

The Chair: Just before I go to the other speakers, the rules are that here, at this committee, the intention to have the approval to take this trip or to try to take this trip only requires a majority vote. When it goes, and if it gets approval of the budget subcommittee, then it has to be presented to the whole House of Commons, and there it needs majority vote.

You and I can disagree, but I happen to think that the fact that one member, even for the petty reason that he or she is not on the trip, can kill the trip is rather ludicrous. But we can agree to disagree on that.

In a minute I'll call the vote on this motion. If the majority of members support the motion, I will then take this proposed trip budget to the liaison budget subcommittee of the House. If they say yes, which they don't always do, then it goes to the House of Commons, where a party or an individual member can kill the trip.

Mr. Jim Hart: On a point of clarification, sir, my schedule is starting to book up as well. Is there a way, if it was approved, we could change the date of March 5? Do we have to submit a firm date on the trip?

The Chair: Oh, no, we can change the date. If they approve it in principle, then we can make it fit any date that works.

• 1625

I heard Gordon. Realistically, I'm not going to plan to be on this trip, because I heard Mr. Laurin giving us an honest answer that the Bloc is not going to support it at this time. The point you're making is that you want it on record that at least you're trying to go and do trips that you think are valuable for the committee.

Mrs. Longfield.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: There's just one point, and I don't want to belabour it, but on the suggestion that somehow this is undemocratic when 80% to 90% of the members of the committee want to go, that somehow we're usurping someone's democratic right, quite frankly, I think it's preposterous that sitting here in government, one, two or three, a very small minority, can dictate the travel of the majority.

With due respect to Mr. Laurin, the opposition does propose travel, and the clarity issue is one. It was a majority, not just one, that said no. You may not like that, and there are times when I'm on the other side and a majority want to do something that I don't want to do, but the fact of the matter is that it was a majority; it wasn't just one single person.

The way it is now, the committee can grind to a halt. One person, whether he or she represents a party or whether it is an individual decision, can stop the progress of a committee. I think that is very undemocratic. My privilege is violated there when, as I say, one person, for whatever reason, can deny that kind of thing.

I think the rules have to be changed. This committee should send a very strong message to the committee that's looking at changes to the rules in the House, indicating that we feel it needs to be changed as quickly as possible. It won't help us in the situation now, but I think this committee has suffered unduly as a result of this.

The Chair: Okay. I'll come back to you after this motion is dealt with to give you an opportunity to propose such a motion if you wish.

I want to call the vote now on whether or not the committee wants to approve this trip.

Mr. Laurin.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman...

[English]

The Chair: Can we keep it on this trip? We've both talked about Bill C-20, but the topic here now is, are we going to approve this trip?

The member has the right, but I want him to speak to this trip. Are we going to approve this trip, yes or no?

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: I would just like to make a comment following what Mrs. Longfield said. These rules that are imposed on committees did not come out of nowhere or get written overnight. There are reasons for requiring unanimous consent. As a general rule, the idea of unanimity works very well because committees travel a lot. The requirement for unanimous consent has thus not prevented committees from travelling or doing their work. From time to time, committees may not get consent to travel. It is on a case- by-case basis, but once again, if the rules that were established called for unanimous consent, I believe that it is for serious reasons. I was not there when these rules were adopted. Before calling into question the principle of unanimity in the House, it might be worth going back to find out why that requirement was put in place.

[English]

The Chair: All right.

Okay, I want to call the question on this trip.

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: So I will take this to the liaison committee budget subcommittee.

Mrs. Longfield, did you wish to make a subsequent motion?

Mrs. Judi Longfield: I don't know how to phrase it, and I would look to the clerk, but essentially—

The Chair: That the committee go on record....

Mrs. Judi Longfield: That the committee go on record as indicating that this unanimous consent be looked at very seriously, that I think it's infringing upon the autonomy of committees, and that there has to be another way.

The Chair: Okay.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: It would be something of that nature.

The Chair: Just by your saying that, it's on the record, but you still want to make it a formal motion passed.

So there's a motion that the committee take a position that the current rules allowing one member to prevent a committee from going on a valid trip are antiquated and need change.

Is that the spirit of the motion?

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Pretty much.

The Chair: That's the spirit of the motion. We've had a lot of discussion about it already. Is there any new discussion from a member before I call the vote?

Mr. Bertrand.

• 1630

Mr. Robert Bertrand: There's just one last thing. Where does the motion go?

The Chair: The clerk is suggesting a letter to the Speaker and that we forward our motion to the committee studying the rules.

Mr. Robert Bertrand: Okay.

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: The next item—

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: For my own information, I would like to know if the proposal which has been passed by a majority here will be sent to the Board of Internal Economy.

[English]

The Chair: I misled you, and I apologize.

Mr. René Laurin: I just want to understand.

The Chair: I'll explain now.

This committee can write to the Speaker, and just voted to write to the Speaker, indicating the majority of the committee is unhappy with the rules. That's it.

As we said earlier and I forgot, we as a committee cannot refer something to another committee. So we're just going to write to the Speaker.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: My question is not on that. I did not ask you if we would be writing to the Speaker to ask him to review the rules.

My question deals with giving approval or not for this travel. The majority of the committee members agreed to travel. You told us that such a motion normally needed unanimous consent. You are telling us that the motion for this travel was passed by a majority and I thought I understood that it would be sent to the Board of Internal Economy. Is that right?

[English]

The Chair: I'm not sure you're understanding. Let me try again.

At the committee here, only a majority has to support a trip, which we just did. You opposed it.

Now I take it to the budget subcommittee of the liaison committee. If they approve, it then goes to the House of Commons, where only one member, even, can kill the trip. That's this trip.

The second thing we voted on was to write to the Speaker saying we find the rules for approval of a trip outdated.

I'm not sure what your concern is.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, whether this motion on travel was passed unanimously or by a majority, it will not change the procedure at the next stages. It is the same. If there had been unanimous consent, we would still had sent the motion to the budget subcommittee. What does it matter whether there was unanimity or a majority? The procedure is the same.

[English]

The Chair: That's right.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: All right. That is what I wanted to understand.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Earle.

Mr. Gordon Earle: I have another question. Even before it gets to the full House, when it goes before the liaison committee, that's an all-party committee, right?

The Chair: Right.

Mr. Gordon Earle: So that committee could reject it by one member as well.

The Chair: Yes, by one member.

The Clerk: No, in the liaison committee it's a majority.

The Chair: So it's a majority of the liaison committee. Having been there on your behalf, I'd say they just tend to work for consensus. It seems all or none of them like it at that subcommittee. It's when you go to the House that the other factors come into play.

Mrs. Longfield.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: I know we can't refer to the committee on procedure and House affairs, but can we copy the chair? Can we send a letter to the Speaker and a copy to the chair?

The Clerk: Yes.

The Chair: Sure. That's a good suggestion. We'll do that.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: That way, it's not referable; it's a....

The Chair: We can “cc” the chair, as an individual MP.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Yes.

The Chair: Okay, very good.

So that's done. Thank you.

Can we go now to item 3, the Cheyenne briefing? It's not really a briefing; I just want to talk about what came out of that meeting, for the members.

Four of us—Mr. Clouthier, Mr. O'Reilly, Mr. Pratt, and I—were able to go, were able to take up the invitation from General Baril, who had invited the whole committee. The whole committee was invited to attend, through the clerk. Some had been there before and didn't want to go back. Others wanted to go but were unavailable. Anyway, four of us were able to go.

I want to share with colleagues that it was a fascinating trip. I thought it was very worthwhile, a busy two days.

• 1635

I want to tell the members of the committee who weren't there that at the request of the Deputy CINC, as the military calls them.... The Deputy CINC is the Deputy Commander in Chief of NORAD, Lieutenant- General George Macdonald, who will be appearing before this committee on February 29, 2000, on the missile defence proposal with the States. He treated the four of us very well and invited the committee to come back again.

He asked if we would be willing to talk to some of the members, and we said certainly, we're four politicians, and we'll talk to Canadians anywhere, especially men and women in the Canadian Forces. We turned it into a kind of impromptu town hall meeting. We had about 60 to 70 people in the hall, and it was a very interesting meeting. They raised a number of questions, and I just want to put them on the record of this committee. I'm going to ask the staff to help with some answers back to these people, because we haven't got back to them yet.

A major concern of the members at the meeting was the taxation of dependants by Revenue Canada. This doesn't happen just to the military, as they pointed out, but dependants are considered non-residents of Canada now when they go outside the country, and it changes their tax status. That was probably the biggest sore point we heard that day. I'm going to ask Wolf and/or Corinne to help me out here to draft a letter back to these people in the near future.

I want to go on record with letters to the appropriate departments, and rather than do it as the chairman, I thought if the whole committee endorsed it, it would be better. So if the whole committee wants, it can send a letter to the Minister of Revenue supporting this concern.

The second one was travel on air services. Some of you might remember this from the discussions about the quality-of-life report. Seniority is no longer considered when you want to go on these flights. A senior person in the military used to be able to call up and get preference for a flight for his or her work, or to travel. That's no longer the case now, and that's caused some friction. Frankly, some of the forces seemed to think it was fine, that it was a good idea, but some didn't like it.

One chap raised the issue of the pension. They were very complimentary to SCONDVA and the work this committee did—the raise in pay and so on. One man raised the point that he's in his last couple of years and the raise is not going to help him very much. He's already had his best five years, but it's going to hurt his pension, because he didn't have the raise three years ago, when it would have helped him more, though he's glad his colleagues are getting it. He asked why there isn't some sort of compensation to those who are getting out in the next year or two to help their pensions. So I promised we would raise that.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Are we going through all of these?

The Chair: No, what I'm doing is giving you four or five concerns, then I'm going to ask for your feedback on what we want to do.

There was one man who raised a point about education. If you are in ROTC school, the Canadian Forces fund your education 100%. If you're in the forces now and you further your education, they only fund 50%. I told the guy that I didn't think that was on the top of the list of problems we had.

The last one was—and I'm going to ask the other people who were on the trip, and the staff, if I missed any—on reimbursement for medical expenses when you're out of the country. If you go to a doctor other than a Canadian military doctor, you pay, and you seek reimbursement. It can be a long time to get reimbursement for your medical expenses, so how could we speed up payment?

There are two or three that Lieutenant-General Macdonald suggested he would deal with directly, so we turned those over to him.

These are the ones I need to get back to the forces on, and I want to hear if there are any others that other members have. This isn't a free-for-all. It's just coming out of the Cheyenne trip. Then I want to go to the staff too.

Mr. O'Reilly.

Mr. John O'Reilly: Yes, Mr. Chairman, out of that town hall meeting I received a submission today from one of the members on medical benefits, so I'll give it to the clerk to have it translated and circulated to the members. I just got it.

One of the fellows who was there had complained about the medical things. He had sent in $4,000 out of his own money, because he was only reimbursed at the Ontario rate or the Alberta rate, or whatever it was. You'd have to wait six months to get your money back if your wife were in the hospital or something. So he's written a paper on it, and I'll give it to the clerk. I don't have it here, but I'll get it.

• 1640

The Chair: Thank you.

Hec, did you have anything I didn't cover?

Mr. Hec Clouthier: No.

The Chair: It was a very interesting meeting. We had coffee afterwards, and they came up to us individually. As we said, if they'd rather raise it individually than in front of 60 people...some of them definitely did. One came to Corinne, our researcher, and said she had a concern about the awarding of the Order of Military Merit to women in the Canadian Forces, and how long that was taking. What was the concern exactly?

Ms. Corinne McDonald (Committee Researcher): The question was with regard to what efforts were being made to increase the percentage of women who received the order, and how they were nominated to that order.

The Chair: So more recognition of women's contributions in the forces.

Did you have any others?

I can do this on my own as the chairman, but what I'd like to ask the committee to do, if you're agreeable.... The reason I brought it you was, first, for information for those who weren't on the trip, just to share it; and second, if you endorse the idea, then I'm going to ask the staff to be in contact with the appropriate people and give us an answer so we can draft a letter back to the people in Colorado Springs.

Mr. Earle.

Mr. Gordon Earle: One of the questions I was going to ask was where Cheyenne Mountain is, but I guess it's in Colorado Springs.

The Chair: Colorado Springs, yes.

Mr. Gordon Earle: And when was that trip?

The Chair: To NORAD headquarters? That trip was January 31. You should have had notification. Everybody was invited to attend. Not everybody could attend, obviously.

Mr. Gordon Earle: And the people there at Cheyenne Mountain would be from all across—

The Chair: All across Canada. Like any other unit, they're Canadian men and women, a full range of ages, from right across the country, and working in very close tandem with the Americans in Cheyenne Mountain to fulfil our NORAD commitment. But also, as they explained to us, there are really three commands in that mountain. For example, there's the U.S. Space Command.

The next big question, the thing they're really concerned about—it's our next committee topic—is whether Canada is going to go into a ballistic missile defence system for North America with the United States—when we're officially asked. We haven't been officially asked yet. As part of our RMA theme, this is the next topic the majority of the committee wanted to go into, so we'll start next week.

That leads me to our discussion of our future work, which René mentioned earlier.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: On that, one issue I'm not in agreement with and I don't want to be on record for is with regard to the gentlemen who has the problem with the pension, only because there are millions of Canadians who are in that situation. In Ontario alone, with the social contract, everyone who took a cut in pay or who did not see their salaries increase just before retirement is in that spot. We wish it weren't happening to anyone, but I would have great difficulty singling out members of the armed forces on that.

The Chair: Well, that may be the answer we give them. You're right, there's a starting point for these programs. But unless the committee objects, I'm just asking you to endorse that we would search out the answers to these concerns.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: I don't mind searching out the answers. I don't want us to be in—

The Chair: The answer may be that we're sorry he got caught, but whenever you start a government program, somebody gets caught. I think we should at least explore it and see what we hear from folks. Is it agreeable to do that?

Okay, thank you very much.

[Translation]

Mr. Laurin.

Mr. René Laurin: I have a few questions for you, Mr. Chairman.

How many committee members took part in that mission?

The Chair: Four.

Mr. René Laurin: Were there any opposition members?

The Chair: Four members.

Mr. René Laurin: Four committees?

The Chair: No, no.

Mr. René Laurin: You mean four committee members, but no opposition members.

Was the delegation accompanied by staff?

[English]

The Chair: Yes, we had the two researchers.

Mr. Wolfgang Koerner (Committee Researcher): There were a couple of representatives from National Defence. In fact there were four members from the committee and the research staff.

• 1645

The Chair: There were four Liberal members because none of the opposition was available at that time.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: So there were four members of the committee and six employees?

[English]

Mr. Wolfgang Koerner: There were two from our staff. DND can send whomever they want; that doesn't apply to us.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: I'm asking that question, Mr. Chairman, because we received a letter asking us to authorize staff to participate in that mission. If our authorization was requested, it must have been necessary. I did not authorize staff participation and I wonder how these employees were able to go on the trip.

[English]

The Chair: The situation there was—and I regretted it—if my information was correct, the Bloc Québécois refused to allow the committee clerk to go. To be honest with you, respectfully, as a colleague, I found that to be kind of petty. But it was their right, and they refused to allow the clerk to go. No one party has the authority to stop the research staff from going, because they work for the parliamentary library of the whole House. No one party can block that.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, I am sorry, but I do not appreciate that comment about pettiness. We were not targeting individuals. Although I refused to give my approval, I have nothing against Mr. Morawski or his colleague. I have nothing against these people, but I objected to having staff on the trip.

[English]

The Chair: The proper procedure was followed. You and I discussed it.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: Did the travel expenses for these two people come out of the House budget? If not, who paid for them?

[English]

The Chair: There was no House of Commons fund.

Do you want to clarify, Wolf?

Mr. Wolfgang Koerner: I don't do budgets; that's the clerk. I think Eugene should clarify that.

[Translation]

The Clerk: The defence department assumed that expense. The House of Commons did not pay anything toward it.

Mr. René Laurin: The defence department paid for everything.

The Clerk: Yes.

Mr. René Laurin: Including the travel expenses for the staff and the delegation?

The Clerk: Yes.

[English]

The Chair: Accommodation, everything else.

[Translation]

The Clerk: If I recall, the motion stated that the House of Commons would not assume any of the expenses.

Mr. René Laurin: Even if everyone had said yes, when we received the letter asking for authorization for the staff to travel, who would have paid your travelling expenses?

The Clerk: The defence department.

Mr. René Laurin: As well?

The Clerk: Yes.

Mr. René Laurin: Then why were they asking for our approval if it did not mean anything?

Mr. Robert Bertrand: Initially, the plan was for the House of Commons to pay all the travel expenses. But after the Bloc Québécois rejected the funding request, the Department of National Defence decided to pay for the trip because it decided that it was very important to have some members of the committee visit Colorado Springs.

Mr. René Laurin: Fine. I understand it's the Department of National Defence.

The Clerk: The invitation from the department was sent to all members of the committee.

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, once again, I want to stress to these people that I have nothing against them. On the contrary, I admire the work they do and I recognize they're quite devoted. I wanted to be fully understood that I was not targeting them personally. It was just a question.

[English]

The Chair: We understand that. We don't think you have any personal.... I found it tough that we couldn't help our clerk, but those are the rules and the rules were followed. There's nothing you can do.

Just as an interesting observation, while a lot of these trips are being killed by the opposition parties, the opposition members are travelling all over the place with ministers on various important trips. Meanwhile, other members are not allowed to travel. So it's a little frustrating sometimes. Anyway, let's go on.

The last thing I have here is a request of the committee by an individual—I met with him in my office—Robert Roy, from Great Scot Films. He produces documentaries and he would like to have the committee's.... I explained I would need a letter making the request. He's been contracted to do a documentary on defence in Canada by Global TV. I explained to him that he would have to have our permission to come in during the meeting and shoot some film of the meeting in progress, a witness or a member making a point or whatever, to try to tell the defence story and how we work and what we're trying to do to support our forces.

• 1650

I told him my personal opinion was that I had no problem with it, but I would have to get the approval of the majority of the committee to allow this to happen. Normally the TV cameras stop when you hit the gavel. We would have to make sure he follows all the rules and check it out with the Speaker's office.

There's the request. The request is on the floor for discussion.

Mrs. Longfield.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: I have absolutely no objection. These are open hearings and I think we should do it. The only thing is that if it's being used for a documentary, I think we would need to get the consent of whatever witness we have here. The witness has agreed to come before our committee, but the witness should also be aware that he or she could be appearing in a documentary.

With that proviso, I think it's wonderful.

The Chair: That's a very good point. If the committee agrees to the request, I would ask the clerk to pre-notify each witness and get their answer, yes or no, to being taped during their statement.

Mr. Bertrand and Mr. Laurin.

Mr. Robert Bertrand: I have one quick question. How much are we getting paid to do this?

The Chair: You'd better get an agent, Bob.

Voices: Oh, oh!

The Chair: We need about 10 more minutes, colleagues, and we'll finish early.

[Translation]

Mr. Laurin.

Mr. René Laurin: Mr. Chairman, who will pay for the production of this documentary and what will it be used for?

[English]

The Chair: As I understand it.... I can provide members with copies of the letter. Maybe I should have done that. I'm sorry; I just got it yesterday, though.

Global TV is hiring this man and his firm to produce a documentary for Global Television on defence in Canada, on parliamentary involvement in how we make defence work in this country, witnesses we hear, topics we study, how we try to get more funding for defence, the whole defence story, if you will. Global TV has hired this man to produce a documentary. I told him he couldn't come in without committee approval.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: So it was all...

[English]

The Chair: How much do you want for an appearance?

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: I want to make sure I understand this. I'm intrigued. You're telling me that it was fully funded by Global, in other words, by private enterprise.

What will the document be used for once it's made? How is it supposed to be used? Will it be broadcast on television? Will it be used for news reports elsewhere? Will it be used for political purposes?

The Chair: No, not at all.

[English]

It's for Global TV. Let me read you one paragraph:

I am a free-lance television producer based in Toronto and I have been asked to put together a documentary on the future of the Canadian military for Global television network. I have produced numerous programs on public affairs over the past twenty years...

He's been contracted by Global to produce a documentary on the Canadian military to be shown on their television network. They want to involve this committee's deliberations about the Canadian military.

Mrs. Wayne.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: I would like us to make sure that we do this documentary before you give Viagra to the rest of the men.

Voices: Oh, oh!

The Chair: I want to ask for a motion because it's an important matter. I hear your concern. I'd like to have a motion from someone to either approve this man's request or not approve it.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: I approve.

The Chair: Mrs. Wayne moves that we approve this man's request, subject to rules of the House.

An hon. member: Give us all equal time, will you?

The Chair: Oh, I'll do my best. Just make sure you bring a few extra dollars that day.

(Motion agreed to)

• 1655

The Chair: The last, very important item is the future work of the committee, and then we can finish early. We have a long night, I guess.

Not all members of the committee were here, but we've discussed this twice now. We had a preliminary discussion at this committee a couple of meetings ago, but some members were away. The steering committee met last week and discussed it and there was a consensus. I'll report that to you now, and then we'll make our final decisions.

We have a document, which has been given to the staff, on the major topics that the committee members had submitted for consideration. What we saw at the last meeting was a repetition; members from all parties were putting forward topics that we had put forward even in November. Let me run through them with you.

The revolution in military affairs, including missile defence, seems to be by far the topic that most of the members of the committee want to take up next. There's our relationship with the United States and the whole problem of the ITAR, which is not resolved. There's the renewal of the NORAD agreement. Then I mention the ballistic missile. Next is troop levels and our commitments in the world. Are we taking on too much as a country? What is the right level of troops to be involved in the world the way we are? Aboriginal veterans—that's been made a couple of times by Mr. Earle. There's the issue of health concerns of the military and how we resolve them more fairly—things like exposure to anthrax and that kind of thing, vaccinations. I've mentioned the aboriginal affairs, treatment of them, and so on.

Those were the major topics members had raised. Also, a case study on the need for helicopters came up.

Bob.

Mr. Robert Bertrand: There's also the American ballistic....

The Chair: Yes, the ballistic missiles. That's part of RMA.

The committee was very clear that it wanted to make the next topic the revolution in military affairs, including the ballistic missile defence. We've already invited General Macdonald to come on that topic.

Now I will take comments. Mrs. Wayne.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: Last week when we had the people from the shipyards in, they talked about the possibility of a summit. Since then, I had the retired general into my office back home to talk to me. He was saying that when it comes to the armed forces, what we should be looking at is having one ship built. You contract one ship, one frigate, and then you wait two or three years because they'll take a couple of years to complete it, and then wait another year or so. Then you put out to do another.

He said the high technology of today is changing every year. With our last frigates, six were contracted and built in the first contract and then the other six. When it comes time down the road, all of them will have to be put to bed at the same time. He said we should be looking at changing the policy we have.

I was really impressed with what he had to say there. He said there's no question that there is a need for that to take place.

The Chair: We'll add that to the list, for sure.

There's another thing I forgot to mention, colleagues, and then I'll go to the other speakers. We've had a kind of suggestion, really a request. There's a new ADM in defence, Mr. Alan Williams, who may have something useful to offer us as our last witness on procurement. Although the staff is already moving into starting to draft something for us on procurement, we have a spot open next Thursday where we could plug in Mr. Williams as the very final witness on procurement. He's apparently pretty expert on what the British have been doing and so on. It would probably be very useful to hear this man, and then the staff can work in anything he's added. We can put that topic to bed and the staff will give us a report.

Elsie.

• 1700

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: I just wanted to mention to you another gentleman. You were talking about someone who was going to look at research and everything. I have his resumé and I will send it to you, Mr. Chairman. He worked at NORAD.

The Chair: That's good.

Mrs. Elsie Wayne: He worked under Macdonald, and he's all there. You'd be greatly impressed.

The Chair: That would be great. We'll look for that. Thank you.

Now, Mr. Hart, and any other colleagues.

Mr. Jim Hart: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

John Fraser has just completed his minister's monitoring committee report. I don't know if we've considered that as a topic, but if we could take some time to recall John Fraser before the committee and hear from him directly, it would be—

The Chair: Yes, that's a good idea. We'll put that on the list.

You know how these things work, colleagues. We've all been here long enough now. Our next topic is RMA, but then there's a meeting where you don't get some somebody on RMA or they have to cancel, so then maybe that's a good chance to plug in somebody like a John Fraser.

A voice: Estimates.

The Chair: Estimates. Yes, that's a routine thing. We always do estimates and so we'll be doing estimates.... Both ministers have agreed?

The Clerk: The Minister of National Defence has agreed to March 29. I still haven't heard from—

The Chair: March or February?

The Clerk: March. February 29 is next week.

The Chair: Yes, I know.

The Minister of National Defence has agreed to come on March 29; that's for estimates on Defence. Then we have a request into Minister Baker to come and talk to us as soon as he can.

The estimates we always do.

An hon. member: We'll be back on May 1.

The Chair: Yes. We start in May, but we always break away to do estimates. That's always the way the committees do it.

Jim, you had your time.

Mr. Bertrand, Mrs. Longfield, Mr. Earle, and Mr. Laurin.

[Translation]

Mr. Robert Bertrand: Could you indicate when Mr. Williams will come before the committee? You said next Thursday; will it be on February 24 or March 2?

[English]

The Chair: Sorry, March 2. Thursday, March 2.

[Translation]

Mr. Robert Bertrand: Fine. Agreed.

[English]

The Chair: Mrs. Longfield.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: We have a number of topics on that, and I don't disagree that RMA is a good place to start. But have we given any consideration as to how many meetings we are going to need on those various topics?

I think of something like the ITAR. If we're going to be meeting on the RMA and it's going to take us into near the end of June, I wouldn't like something like ITAR to sit. It may be too late to have any significant impact on that. So I think when we're putting those together, if we think it's going to be three meetings, we may slip it in in the middle—

The Chair: That's right.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: —rather than run out of time.

The Chair: It's a good point. As far as I'm concerned, it's understood by the committees and by the colleagues here that you have a certain number of meetings you're planning on a certain topic, but if something else becomes a hotter topic, boom, you throw that in. The ITAR thing has been around a long time; it's being pursued at the highest levels. What we can actually do to help I don't know, but if we decided we wanted a hearing on ITARs, we'll set aside that other topic for the day and we'll bring up—

Mrs. Judi Longfield: I think we need to do that on any of those.

The Chair: Yes. We have flexibility. If, at a moment's notice, this committee tells me to change the agenda, we're going to change the agenda to suit this committee, to do what we think is important.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: So maybe we need to devote a day to look at whether we're going to do the summit, or even just as a discussion amongst ourselves. We need a focus, but I think we need to be flexible enough to deal with some key things.

The Chair: Absolutely.

Mr. Earle, and then Mr. Laurin.

[Translation]

Mr. Gordon Earle: You said we'd start with the RMA. I recognize it's very important. I think that the health problems of our armed forces personnel are also very important and I would hope that we'd start on the DU matter as soon as possible.

Mr. Robert Bertrand: We can't hear the interpreters.

Mr. Gordon Earle: The interpreters are having problems understanding my French, is that it?

Mr. René Laurin: No, that's not it. We're not hearing anything at all.

[English]

Mr. Gordon Earle: The health problem is, to me, more important than the RMA, because if we don't have troops in good health and we don't have confidence in protecting the health of our soldiers, then we can revolutionize as much as we want but it's not going to be the major issue.

• 1705

I think right now there are a lot of issues coming to the forefront around the treatment of our vets who come back suffering from either depleted uranium or other toxic substances or post-traumatic stress disorder. I think we should have a look at the entire gamut of health concerns as quickly as possible and deal with that issue. I think that's a very important one.

The Chair: That's fair enough. I know I asked the minister a health-related question in the House today on that and I was pleased with his answer. But if you're suggesting we could make that 1(a) in our topics, 1 being RMA, 1(a) being if the committee wants—

Mr. Gordon Earle: Yes, I wouldn't want to see it get left to the very end.

The Chair: No. If there's an agreement here, we'll make it the second topic. But it doesn't have to wait until all RMA is done. As you know, we've done that all the time here. You can have two things going along side by side. We had procurement and the other thing going.

So is there an agreement that this would be the second topic to look at? Do I see any objection? Do I hear any objection to the second topic being the health of the military?

Monsieur Laurin.

[Translation]

Mr. René Laurin: I'd just like to say a word on that, Mr. Chairman. I'm a bit surprised that the next matter being suggested for examination is the revolution in the military affairs as the government itself had identified the quality of life of the military as its main priority. The government has already started taking steps to improve the quality of life of the military, but there are still problems. Military personnel coming back from Bosnia-Herzegovina or Kosovo have told us they had very serious problems because of the number of missions they have to undertake, the frequency of those missions and their absence from the country when they're called upon to do their duty. Those people told us—and that was part of their quality of life—Mr. Chairman, that it influenced their whole family life. They have to be absent from home six months at a time to go off on missions and they're sometimes asked to complete two missions in less than two years.

I had thought that we would first consider that matter which actually is part of the priorities the government had set out, in other words the quality of life of the military. This question also dovetails with the concerns of my NDP colleague about their health. I thought we would be looking at that before even looking at the revolution in the military affairs. I was unfortunately absent during the last meeting of the steering committee and I don't know what arguments were brought forth to bump down the examination of the quality of life of the military to second place.

[English]

The Chair: I can answer that. First of all, the quality of life is an ongoing topic that is on the committee's agenda constantly. We built it in that way. Remember, when we went through the clause-by-clause, we built it in that regularly.... We just heard from General Baril recently on the quality of life. We can bring him back any time we want. But on a regular basis we're going to continue to monitor the quality of life. So it's a constant item on our agenda.

There's a missile test by the Americans in April. If that test is successful, the expert advice of our military people, and the advice the American military people shared with us in NORAD at Colorado Springs, is that President Clinton will be under great pressure to approve the missile defence system in June.

So it is an extremely urgent matter for Canada to begin to consider whether we're going to say yes or no when the Americans are most surely going to ask us very soon about this. So it fits right in with the RMA. The RMA's a huge theme, but the missile defence is one part of the theme that's right upon us now.

I hear what you're saying about the health concerns, Mr. Earle, and we can make that right up front too and we can do some hearings on RMA. We can do some hearings on quality of life.

But one of the problems with our parliamentary calendar is we don't always have everybody around the same table. Twice now we've tried to come up with an order of priority, but some members were here and other members were in other meetings. But for the two meetings in a row it was almost unanimous at the committee, among those who were there, that they thought we had to do RMA as number one. That's clearly what I heard, as chairman, on both sides of the table. But it's not to say that quality of life or the health of the.... We've just said that if we consider RMA topic one, then we'll consider 1(a) the health of our forces and the quality of life. But any time we want to get back into quality of life and get our ongoing reports, we can do that.

• 1710

Mr. Wolfgang Koerner: On the quality of life, I was going to say that the annual report will probably be tabled with this committee around March 27, and that will be an avenue for looking at these questions. We can have people come in on the spent uranium issue after that, or whatever have you.

The Chair: So we can go in that direction.

Mr. Wolfgang Koerner: They're finalizing that report right now.

A voice: We could look at the Fraser report.

The Chair: Yes, including the Fraser report. At that point, we could go in that direction for some hearings and go into the quality of life and health of our forces—in that direction.

I have Mr. Bertrand and Mr. Proud.

[Translation]

Mr. Robert Bertrand: Pretty well everything I had to say, Mr. Chairman, on the report on the quality of life has been said. As you know, Mr. David Price, the Conservative member, asked us to call up the people responsible for the implementation of those measures every year to get their report on them. I think that was just about a year ago. As Mr. Koerner, our researcher, indicated before it would be very opportune to call up these people when they table their next report to see what stage they've reached in the implementation.

[English]

The Chair: Before I go to George, because I'll forget and I don't want to forget, it's really important, colleagues—and it's important on our side too because I would have liked to have a couple of more Liberals at the steering committee—in every party that if you can't be there.... We have to try to make sure we have a voice from every party at those steering committees, so that we try to sort out what we want to do. So I'll just ask you in future, if you can't be at a meeting and you're on the steering committee, to see if you can get another colleague so that at least we have all the different groups represented.

Mr. Proud.

Mr. George Proud: Mr. Chairman, I think you've pretty well covered everything I had wanted to say.

In terms of the report on the quality of life, I think this is an ongoing thing. We can go back to it at any time. But I think we don't want to underestimate this revolution in military affairs and the missile defence system. This is something that quite likely Canada is going to be asked to go into, and we're going to have to make a decision. Somebody's going to have to make a decision on it.

If we have first go at it here and we have some idea of what's going to take place, then I think we can make some recommendations to the government and make some recommendations to the Department of National Defence. I think it's very important that we get involved in this—not leaving aside, of course, the health of the CF people or anything else. But I think it's very important we get into this RMA and into the missile defence system.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

Are there any other comments about the future work of the committee? I think we have a pretty long list. We've heard the members' concerns.

Thank you. We'll see you Thursday morning at 9 o'clock. There's a department briefing by officials on RMA to set the stage for us on RMA. So 9 a.m. sharp, please.

The meeting is adjourned.