SMEM Committee Meeting

SUB-COMMITTEE ON PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS OF THE STANDING COMMITTEE ON PROCEDURE AND HOUSE AFFAIRS

SOUS-COMITÉ DES AFFAIRES ÉMANANT DES DÉPUTÉS DU COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA PROCÉDURE ET DES AFFAIRES DE LA CHAMBRE

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Wednesday, May 16, 2001

• 1536

[English]

The Chair (Mrs. Carolyn Parrish (Mississauga Centre, Lib.)): I'd like to call the meeting to order and explain what we're doing. Yesterday it became a little jumbled.

The two people who didn't get an opportunity to present are here today. We do have one space available. If we listen to these two presentations, compare them with what we heard yesterday, and decide that one of them should be a votable item, then they're not wasting their time. And we do have that option.

It's good that we have almost the same composition as yesterday. Mr. Dubé had to leave. But we have a quorum and we can begin.

Judy.

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis (Winnipeg North Centre, NDP): Thank you very much for the opportunity. I appreciate the second chance. I realize yesterday—

The Chair: No, I'm really sorry. It wasn't your fault.

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: At any rate, I appreciate this opportunity.

The motion before you is M-350. Its purpose is basically to call upon the government, in consultation with the provincial and territorial governments, to put in place a system of mandatory reporting for adverse drug reactions. It flows from a recent case we're all familiar with, Vanessa Young, who was taking the drug Propulsid and who died.

Now, the coroner's inquest couldn't determine absolutely that there was a link between the drug and her death, but they did make a recommendation that an adverse reaction was a factor in her death. We've heard about this type of situation at other times.

I've brought the motion here because I think it's urgent, I think it falls under federal jurisdiction, and I think it is of significant public interest.

We now have in place a system of voluntary reporting of adverse drug reactions. I'm suggesting it should be a mandatory system. That's the recommendation of the coroner's inquest in the case of Vanessa Young. It's also the recommendation of the Canadian Medical Association. I think it could be done without a lot of cost and a lot of jurisdictional wrangling. I think it makes sense, and I hope it's seen as a constructive proposition for the government.

The Chair: Thank you.

Are there any questions for Ms. Wasylycia-Leis?

Yes, Monsieur Proulx.

Mr. Marcel Proulx (Hull—Aylmer, Lib.): In day-to-day practice how do you see this being applied? You recommend we establish a system for the mandatory reporting of adverse drug reactions, but how do you see this working on a day-to-day basis so that Mr. and Mrs. Neighbour will know about it? Because this is the idea, isn't it?

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: Yes, and you raise an important point. It's not only the reporting of the adverse reaction but also the communication of that information.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That's right.

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: I'm proposing to deal with part of that problem by at least moving from a voluntary to a mandatory system so that there is a central gathering place for all information about drugs and adverse reactions. Presumably that information would then get transmitted and communicated to all physicians across this country.

Now, I'm not suggesting a method in this motion to deal with that whole problem. I'm trying to deal with the part about getting the information into a central location. Right now it's hit-and-miss. In fact the study suggests that most drugs, when there are adverse reactions, don't actually end up reported centrally because it is on a volunteer basis. Sometimes physicians forget, sometimes it's not a requirement.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Is there not anything through Health Canada that is compulsory?

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: No. That's why I raise this.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: There's no system whatsoever.

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: There's a system for voluntary reporting.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: There's no duplication in this from what the government is now doing, whether it be Health Canada or whoever else could look after it? I guess it's only Health Canada.

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: It now is the responsibility of Health Canada. It's the method by which they do it that is in question, the fact that it's a voluntary system. I'm suggesting it should move from a voluntary to a mandatory system.

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We still would have to deal with the problem of making sure we have an effective way to get out the information on a timely basis. The Canadian Medical Association has made some suggestions along those lines that I think we need to pursue and follow up on in Parliament.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Thank you.

The Chair: I think Pat has a question.

Mr. Pat Martin (Winnipeg Centre, NDP): Which organizations and groups did you say were actively interested in seeing this come about? You mentioned the Canadian Medical Association, but during your initial remarks didn't you list some other organizations that were calling for this?

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: Actually, this issue has been raised by a number of groups over the years. It's really come to a head since April, with the coroner's inquest into Vanessa Young's case, and the Canadian Medical Association took a fairly public role for the first time on this issue. But certainly various consumer groups and health organizations and coalitions have raised this off and on. It's only recently that I think people have really realized the downside of the system we have today.

Mr. Pat Martin: Do you think there'd be a real cost factor associated with it or do you think it could be accomplished within the existing agencies or information collection bureaucracies?

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: I believe it could be accomplished within the existing system in Health Canada given that we have a capacity now for gathering information that comes in on a voluntary basis and then some form of dissemination. I don't think going from a voluntary to a mandatory system would add too much of a cost factor to Health Canada.

Mr. Pat Martin: Good. Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Judy.

Ms. Judy Wasylycia-Leis: Thank you.

The Chair: Mr. Dubé, I would like to apologize to you if this is a bit confusing. We thought we were finished yesterday, but we did have two people who wanted to present and were unable to then, so we just extended this part of the meeting a little bit. The meeting was originally scheduled to go over the survey results on private members, which you don't have to stay for. You can have someone else come in.

[Translation]

Mr. Antoine Dubé (Lévis-et-Chutes-de-la-Chaudière, BQ): I discussed this with Michel Guimond. Since he didn't hear the other debates, he would prefer that I continue. This will take about half an hour.

[English]

The Chair: Okay. Thank you very much.

Mr. Herron, and again, my apologies.

Mr. John Herron (Fundy—Royal, PC): I thank you for showing an element of flexibility in terms of your schedule.

The Chair: I think you should say “a great deal” of flexibility, because “an element” sounds a little confrontational.

Mr. John Herron: A great deal of immense flexibility; I appreciate the gesture.

This is an issue I've tried to follow since I was elected the first time, around 1997, and again this time, in 2000. This is a commitment I made to my constituents. The perspective I'd like to speak from is that, first off, I'm a strong advocate of the need to have very prudent, comprehensive, and rigorous regulations and rules in terms of the management of firearms in Canada. That's the kind of society I want to live in.

In Canada, just to state the point, we've registered handguns since the 1930s, while the Americans take the very antiquated approach to those types of things that doesn't reflect our values.

As a party, we brought in a piece of legislation that was at the time known as Bill C-17. It was slated during that era to be one of the most comprehensive firearms legislations that existed in the industrialized world. In our view, and in the view of many other Canadians, that bill didn't have a chance to really take hold for us to be able to see what kind of impact it could have had in obtaining our objective—that is, to deter the criminal use of firearms.

As you know, the previous bill brought in, known as Bill C-68 of the day, was to have forced a registration system of all firearms, including the long gun. Now, a long gun of a deer hunter, duck hunter, and farmer—a shotgun and a rifle—is essentially like a shovel in some rural communities. It's part of what they need to actually carry out their functions.

In modern society, from a safety perspective, I think we must continue to store our ammunition and our firearms in separate locations to avoid accidents. It's the registration program that's the controversial aspect. The bill would remove all weapons or firearms that are not prohibited or restricted, which means long guns, from the mandatory registry. It still means we would have to have a system—for instance, possession only, or FAC, which we had before.

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It's also been a controversial issue from a cost perspective. Originally we had advocated to Canadians, as the Government of Canada, that the implementation of this program would cost around $85 million. That was the number put out in literature. The low number now, according to the Auditor General, or the minimum that will be spent to fully implement this program, is $400 million. Most estimates say there's very little likelihood that it won't hit $800 million. That's a big gap when you start getting into a difference of $400 million.

The bottom line is that this is a huge chunk of change, and it isn't what it was originally billed to be. We're saying that given the fact that we are potentially getting into an economic downturn, and that the amount of dollars that will have to be allocated to fully implement this program will be immense, we should use these several hundred millions of dollars for more health care—

The Chair: Can I just interrupt you? I'm going to try to be helpful.

What you're really doing is building a case for voting for your bill. You're not building a case for making it votable. Now, what I'd like you to do for the committee is convince us that this bill should be votable, not that we should vote for it.

Mr. John Herron: Why should the issue be votable? We'll go back to the cost issue. Maybe the will and the desire to have a mandatory registry for long guns came initially out of good reasons, but given that the cost is nowhere near where it should be, maybe this is an opportunity for the Government of Canada to cut its losses and say, for instance, “We'd rather use this money for other purposes, to fight organized crime, to give more money to the RCMP for more personnel and new technologies”. As well, this would give the House of Commons a very clear issue, and if they fundamentally believe the registration of long guns is something we should have, the House of Commons will be able to express their will on that specific aspect. That's been the specific aspect that's been very much confrontational in rural Canada.

So this would be a chance for the House of Commons to vote in the House about whether the long gun registry really is a necessary component of our firearms legislation and whether it justifies the cost. It's a chance for us to either cut our losses or reaffirm clearly that the addition of long guns, a very contentious issue, was the right thing to do. That's the issue the House of Commons would have a chance to express their will on.

The bill maintains all the safety provisions afforded in Bill C-68 with the mere exception of the long gun registry itself. Because there's a paper trail of possessions only or FACs, every individual would still be registered, so people would know whether you're a firearm owner or not. We just wouldn't have to do the cost of registering all the long guns.

That's the issue that I think is in play, and I'd be very pleased to entertain any questions on it,

[Translation]

if any.

[English]

The Chair: Any questions?

Mr. Loyola Hearn (St. John's West, PC): Just one, and it's not a set-up.

Mr. John Herron: No, because we haven't talked about it.

An hon. member: Oh, sure.

Mr. Loyola Hearn: It's true, we haven't.

In the country, support for the gun registration is actually split to a point. The more urban areas are more in favour of the legislation than are the rural areas, simply because long guns are used more in the rural areas. It's perhaps the one factor that has prevented major support across the country for the gun registration law. If long guns were exempt from it, I think you'd see almost total support across the country for the legislation.

That's what I would argue if I were—

Mr. John Herron: We haven't spoken on this issue, really, Loyola, but that is the perception I have right now, that regardless of where you live in Canada, Canadians don't mind playing by the rules with respect to firearms. It's just the long gun component that's been the most contentious.

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There are other contentious issues as well. This is a compromise approach that I have intentionally taken. There have been other members who have worked very diligently on this file for quite some time. This would be an opportunity for us to be able to have this before the House. We were told it was going to be $85 million. Now we know it's at least $400 million, likely toward $800 million. These are Auditor General figures that are floating. This is a chance for us to reaffirm that the long gun registry is necessary to do, or a chance for us to actually cut our losses.

It's really alienated many parts of rural Canada. The House of Commons is also quite fractured right now among different party lines in terms of from region to region.

The Chair: And within parties.

Mr. John Herron: I'll leave the commentary on that part if I can.

But the point is this was a lightning rod in rural Canada, and I think rural Canada deserves to have a chance to have a debate on this. I think it's a minimum that they get a chance in the House of Commons to really debate the cost for the first time. This is what it was supposed to be and really this is what it is. There will be some individuals in the House who say that they know it could be $100 million, but registry of long guns is something that's a strong component that we need to have in our safety act. So let's fuse debate down to that one issue.

The Chair: Are there any further questions?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz (Yorkton—Melville, Canadian Alliance): I have a lot of questions on this. Of course, I would relish the opportunity to have this debated in the House of Commons. Your chances of course are slim to none, because the government doesn't want to bring this up. In fact, you probably won't even get the costs of that bill made available.

I have been trying for years to find out what the costs are and I can't get that information. That seems to be the main argument you've put forward here to bring this forward.

The Chair: Gary, we're doing questions right now.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: So if your argument to make it votable is based on cost, and the government is reluctant to bring that forward, how do you propose to address that issue?

Mr. John Herron: Well, Garry, you and I both know the minimum cost that's been floated out there is around $462 million. Those are government figures. That number on its own is provocative enough to actually stimulate debate. Given that this has a chance to have three hours of debate and be votable and get it to the committee, that would be an opportunity for the first time to call witnesses—departmental officials—to be able to help flesh this particular issue out. This is a first-time opportunity to really get this to a vote in the House of Commons, and maybe get it to committee, but at least have three hours of debate to advance this.

You prefaced your comments by saying you would really desperately like to have a vote on this particular issue. Well, sir, I would say to you that you have more impact on that particular issue than I might have after these doors close.

I know you've put your shoulder to the wheel on this particular file. I would ask you sincerely to participate to your fullest in the decision-making process, if you think this is something that rural Canadians should have a chance to vote on.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: You seem to be aware of what happened in camera, which means that somebody here has violated the privacy of this committee. I find that a very interesting comment.

The Chair: What are you referring to, Mr. Herron?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: That to me seems to be—

The Chair: Wait a minute, Mr. Breitkreuz. Let's not jump to conclusions.

What are you referring to, Mr. Herron?

Mr. John Herron: What I'm referring to is, when I appeared here yesterday, I sensed in the room that there was a very difficult situation with the committee, as if it wasn't a good day.

The Chair: But you also I think overheard Mr. Breitkreuz himself continue in a discussion with me. No one told you anything. You overheard his conversation with me as he was leaving. Is that not accurate?

Mr. John Herron: Right. I heard the two of you saying about the participation levels and—

The Chair: Yes, okay.

Mr. John Herron: I'm trying to express—

The Chair: I understand, and you're perfectly within your right to say that. Mr. Breitkreuz was jumping to a conclusion.

Mr. John Herron: I'm just trying to find some goodwill here. I don't want to become a wedge here. I'm supposed to be trying to kiss up as best as I possibly can.

The Chair: And you're doing it amazingly.

An hon. member: Very good.

Mr. John Herron: So in that vein, a lot of Canadians have put a lot of issues in this. This has been a non-starter among many rural parts of the country.

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I understand the will or why the government did this. I don't believe Bill C-17 was given its proper chance in the first place. This is an immense amount of cash we're looking at. If we're going to spend that much cash—and we haven't spent it yet—then why don't we give the House of Commons a chance to save several hundred million dollars?

The Chair: All right.

Mr. Dubé has a question. I'm going to ask you to try to shorten your answers, because we've got a whole hour of debate on our survey.

Mr. Dubé.

[Translation]

Mr. Antoine Dubé: Mr. Herron, there is no doubt that many of your arguments are entirely sound. However, as Madam Chair said, you are arguing by...

I have one concern. I don't want to come out for or against the bill, because that is not the point of the debate. What interests me is whether it is going to be made votable. Have you considered other ways to make your views known?

I have two or three questions. First of all, when you previously attempted to make your views known, did you table a private member's bill like this one, or a motion? Did you do that and was it examined? If so, what results did you obtain?

Mr. John Herron: I tabled a bill during the last Parliament, but at that time, the bill was not drawn.

[English]

It wasn't pulled. The bill wasn't pulled before. I had it before the House. It died on the order paper. I reinstituted it. I made a commitment to my constituents that I would table it, and if the gods be willing, I would get it pulled and we might be able to have it debated as well.

The Chair: We're trying not to pull religion into this, Mr. Herron. You've pulled out every sock available.

A voice: Shame on you.

The Chair: You have not offered your firstborn child, but....

Mr. John Herron: No, I draw the line at Rosemary for sure.

[Translation]

Mr. Antoine Dubé: That's what I thought, but I wanted to make sure.

When I myself tabled a private members bill, we could have more rapid access with the support of 100 members. Did you consider that strategy since it was possible at the time? It no longer exists, but at the time... In other words, did you think you would have the support of at least 100 members?

[English]

Mr. John Herron: I actually thought I could have a chance at getting 100 members. As you know, things can be taxing with the number of members, which we have.

I tabled it toward the end of the spring session. I think it was around May of last year. I don't recall exactly. We all knew we were heading to an election. My perception was I thought we were heading to an election, but by the time we hit, fall came around. I knew it would die on the order paper, so I didn't pursue that avenue.

Also, the committee might actually recall that the 100-member signature thing was starting to become a little bit contentious, as the clerk is nodding. Given that it was going to be contentious, I thought it was a dead duck at that point.

So this is what I consider to be the best shot. What I was going to do is that the....

[Translation]

Mr. Antoine Dubé: So you were not very optimistic.

[English]

Mr. John Herron: No, I wasn't optimistic about whether I was going to get the 100 signatures. I thought the Conservatives would support it. I had received some support from rural NDP individuals who were interested in it—the one who represents Thompson, Manitoba, Beverly Desjarlais. I would assume the Reform and the Alliance would be of the same ilk. Rural members from the Bloc may be interested as well. I suspect there are individuals who voted against C-68 on the Liberal side. So to chase down 100 votes would have been tough. Was it possible? Maybe.

The Chair: All right. I think you've answered that question adequately.

Are there any further questions?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Just one correction. You've portrayed this as a rural-urban issue. That really is not factually accurate.

There is really no benefit in the cities either. Having a debate such as you're proposing would be very effective in educating even members of Parliament to the fact that it's a money issue—taking resources away from where it could be used more effectively in the city.

• 1600

I don't think you're quite spot on with the urban-rural thing. It's not helping anyone in the cities either.

Mr. John Herron: I would agree. I would say to the member that I look at this issue as a taxation issue and a money allocation issue. Where do you get the best bang for your buck?

The intent and goodwill with registering long guns I won't challenge as being entirely evil. With hindsight, we now know it wasn't the package for which we had asked.

It would help to educate urban Canada on this particular issue. As you know, it's far more contentious in the rural parts of my riding and in the rural parts of Canada than it is in other areas.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I think it is more contentious because they're more aware of the ineffectiveness of the law.

Mr. John Herron: That's right.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: It is not about gun control. It has been portrayed as such, and it really isn't. There's a chance for you to bring that out.

The Chair: Can we try to shorten this debate?

Mr. John Herron: I'll wrap up with one aspect.

The Chair: Please do so.

Mr. John Herron: To deter crime, we need to register handguns. It's the intent of what we're trying to do. We've done it since the 1930s.

I'm advocating that weapons not restricted or prohibited, long guns, shotguns, and rifles, do not deter the criminal use of firearms.

It's more about taxation. We're just taxing innocent deer hunters, duck hunters, and farmers. We're wasting Canadian funds, as opposed to allocating our resources to fight organized crime.

I would dearly like to have the opportunity to put this before the House.

The Chair: Thank you very much. Thank you for taking the trouble to come back again today, and for your good humour.

Mr. John Herron: I appreciate it from the bottom of my heart.

The Chair: I assume your forgiveness of my oversight.

Mr. John Herron: Oh, absolutely. You even helped me at question period today. I am totally grateful in that respect.

The Chair: Now, go away.

We're going to briefly go in camera to look at the two bills we presented today.

[Proceedings continue in camera]

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[Public proceedings resume]

The Chair: I have a letter from the Special Committee on the Modernization and Improvement of the Procedures of the House of Commons, from Bob Kilger, Deputy Speaker. It says:

Dear Ms. Parrish:

As the work of the Special Committee on the Modernization and Improvement of the Procedures of the House of Commons draws to a close, we are preparing the report to the House of Commons which will be presented by June 1st, 2001. I am writing to seek your assistance with respect to the work you have been doing on the reform of Private Members' Business.

I understand that your Sub-Committee will be meeting on Wednesday, May 16 to discuss the results of your survey of Members. It would be most helpful to our deliberations if you would be prepared to share your observations and conclusions in time for us to take these into consideration in drafting our own report.

I do hope that you will be prepared to share your views with our own Committee. I would be pleased to discuss this matter with you.

Before we start, is there anybody here who doesn't have a copy of the survey results? Everybody does.

I'd like to introduce Peter Niemczak, who works with Jamie and worked on the compilation of the results. And first, I would really like to compliment the whole department on the quality of the survey that was done and the quality of the results. This is really incredibly good. You guys have done a terrific job. I notice that in French you must have a slightly different computer, because your circles are a little smaller.

I would like to note a concern I had when I was going through this for a second time. Of the 301 members of the House of Commons, you have 109 responses. That's about a 33% response. Despite Mr. Kilger's hope that we'll be finished by June 1, I'm wondering if one of the tasks would be to go to the caucuses and have a quick ballot strictly on the question of votability. When I looked at the results, they were not overwhelming, yet when you talk to people, the desire is very strong amongst people who are very involved in this business to have every bill votable. When you look at the results on here, and they're not even skewed by party, it's not strong enough that 50% of 109 people want everything votable.

So keep in mind we're not under any obligation to.... We have to report by the end of this session, but I didn't think it was conclusive enough.

As to the survey, the first question was:

Are you satisfied with the current system of Private Members' Business?

We had 77% unsatisfied. So that was a pretty overwhelming response. They're not happy with it.

You get down to question 2:

Do you think that all items of Private Members' Business that are drawn and placed on the order of precedence should be votable?

Sixty-two percent said yes—that's 62% of 133 people, roughly one-sixth of the House. Am I accurate?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: It's 133?

The Chair: We had 133 surveys, 109 responses. You've got 62%. Help me here, guys.

• 1620

Mr. Marcel Proulx: We're looking at 65, 67.

The Chair: —65 people who want to make all bills and motions votable, that's 20%.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Of the total.

The Chair: Please jump in wherever you want.

Mr. James Robertson (Committee Researcher): Certainly, 109 is only just over 33% of the total membership of the House. It should be noted that we have received an additional five surveys that are not included. In addition, there are a number of members of the House, such as cabinet ministers and chair occupants, who probably do not feel comfortable answering this, because it is primarily for private members. I think we did receive a few from ministers.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That side has 50 people. So it is 50 members who didn't feel comfortable.

Mr. James Robertson: But as a result—

Mr. Marcel Proulx: You should still have 250. For the Liberal caucus, I personally sent out a reminder to everybody, and I had obtained from the clerk the okay to push for a few days. I sent a very detailed and clear reminder. I don't think it brought any more answers—maybe an extra ten. I think the ones who did not answer simply did not want to answer, or maybe we could say they couldn't care less. So as far as my side is concerned, maybe we should consider that the ones who are interested did answer, and maybe we had 37% or 38%.

Mr. James Robertson: Thirty-six percent.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Thirty-six percent of 109, so we had 40 members who answered. Let's take these 40 members as being the ones who know what the heck this is all about and wanted to let us know what they thought.

Did you guys have reminders, and did you push your people, so that everybody would be aware of this announcement?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I reminded them once, yes. I sent out an e-mail—if they're checking their e-mails. So I did remind them on that matter, and we got I don't know what percentage of Alliance members—50% of them?

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Well, you got 30% of 109, so let's say 31.

Mr. James Robertson: Thirty-three members.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Thirty-three members.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: So half of our members replied. I think the explanation for the turn-out rate here is that those who were really interested in private members' business and probably submit bills were the ones who responded.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That's what I'm saying. The others couldn't care less.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I agree with you. To those people private members' business is important, and we should listen to their desires. I don't think we should continue to try to get more people to respond if they don't care. I think it's the same for the Liberal MPs who replied. They probably have bills and motions in the mix; they have an important issue.

The Chair: Two-thirds of the Liberals who responded said no, don't make them votable. During this last session we had two bills come before us that they specifically instructed us they did not want to be votable.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: The key difference that would explain it is that the Liberal MPs already have better input into legislation before the House—or at least it is so perceived.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That's wishful thinking.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I think the key point that needs to be remembered here is that the rules of the House of Commons, the Standing Orders, are there to protect the interests of private members. I'll let that sink in a bit.

If you read the preamble to Beauchesne or any of these other books that deal with it, the reason we have all these rules is to protect private members and their rights, and that's what we're talking about here, Madam Chair, that we need to protect the rights of those members who maybe don't have any other way to bring their issues forward. I submit that as a key element in our discussion today.

The Chair: Do you know what I'd really like to do? This one is, I think, going to be the pivotal decision. I'd like to go through this, and we'll come back to that one. We'll finish looking at all the stats, and we can ask questions of Peter and James, if that's okay with you. We could spend six hours on this debate, and I think in the end what we might be forced to do is just give the raw data to the committee that's looking at this.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Can I ask a question on that?

• 1625

What are they expecting us to do? Recommend something that goes contrary to what the members want, through this survey?

Why don't we submit this to them and say, “Listen, these are the desires of the members of the House of Commons. Obviously, they want bills and motions votable.”

What are we going to accomplish by our discussion here today?

The Chair: Let me answer the first question.

If you'd had the response that 92% wanted them to be votable, I think this committee would have strongly recommended to the committee looking at changing the rules of the House that there was an overwhelming desire, and we would have been very strong in our recommendation.

Try to remember that the survey, which was beautifully constructed, gave the pros and cons in the preamble. We can presume some people read those pros and cons and said, “Wait a minute. I sincerely don't want all the bills votable.”

So we have to decide this was a studied response, because the people who took the trouble to fill that long survey out read the pros and cons and made their decision.

I personally don't feel this is an overwhelming response in favour of changing a system. But it is definitely a majority. So if it were 92%, I'd go in there and fight and say this is what the world wants. At 62% I'm probably—unless we come around to that way of thinking at the end—more comfortable saying, here are the results, committee—made up of House leaders and so forth—and you guys decide.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: But, Madam Chair, I come back to my main point. We're here to protect the rights of those members who really want to have their issues brought forward and made votable. That's primarily the purpose.

The Chair: But not everybody does. That's the point.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: No.

The Chair: That's why I'm telling you 62% of a one-third response is not an overwhelming desire, in my opinion.

Could we leave this one and come back to it at the end?

On number 3, I find it interesting that the largest response there was no response.

What do you read into that, statistician?

Mr. James Robertson: I think the difficulty there was that this question needed to be answered only if you didn't want everything votable. So it was one of those ones that.... We say at the note at the bottom of page 3 of the English that there were 40 members who responded “no” to question 2, that they did not want everything votable. And of those, only 34 answered number 3. So, presumably, the other ones either didn't realize they needed to answer it or had no strong feelings. They just didn't want it made votable.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: But it said if you answered “no” to number 2; so if they answered “yes”, they wouldn't answer this one.

Mr. James Robertson: That's right.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: That's the way the form was structured—

Mr. James Robertson: I think that's why.... I was trying to see, when we designed the chart, if there was some way of showing that, but it would have been misleading.

I think, really, you ignore the black part, and of the people who don't want everything votable, 20% want more to be votable. Only 11% want—

The Chair: The status quo.

Mr. James Robertson: —the status quo, or less to be votable.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: In other words, it's two to one who want more items, Madam Chair. And I think that's a very significant result.

Maybe they didn't want them all votable, but boy, they sure want a lot more of them votable, by a margin of two to one.

The Chair: Okay. If you look at question 4, it says:

If you think that not all items of Private Members' Business should be votable, how should votable items be determined or chosen?

There were 47% with no answer. What does that tell you?

Mr. Peter Niemczak (Committee Researcher): A lot of the people who did not answer questions 3, 4, 5, etc., were the people who—

The Chair: Were satisfied with the status quo?

Mr. Peter Niemczak: Yes. Or they voted “yes” to question 2.

The Chair: Okay.

Mr. Peter Niemczak: And most of the surveys were like that.

Mr. James Robertson: So those members who wanted everything votable really didn't see the need to answer subsequent questions.

The Chair: Okay.

Question 5 asked:

If all or more private Members' bills...and motions...were made votable, would you support the following screening...?

I found this a good result. Seventy-eight percent said to make sure it's constitutional, which is one of our criteria, and 76% said make sure it's not similar to other things that are going on.

I found answer (c) interesting. Obviously a lot of opposition people were voting on this one—not on the government's agenda. That wouldn't stop me. I'm going to get in there and put the same bill on.

Mr. Peter Niemczak: Political affiliation didn't matter to the results on that answer.

The Chair: It didn't?

Mr. Peter Niemczak: Not at all.

The Chair: Absolutely. Good.

Now to the one that involves taxes.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: You have to excuse me.

The Chair: Yes.

• 1630

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Excuse me. Number 5 in English was fairly straightforward, but in French it was somewhat more complicated. The interpretation, when you got to (c) and (d), was somewhat different in the sense that there's a...I wouldn't call it a monkey wrench, but it would be:

[Translation]

“Would you be in favour of this?”

[English]

Would you be in favour of? Then you had to really look at (c) and (d) to decide what way you were going to answer this—whether a “yes” meant a “yes” or a “no”. Do you know what I'm saying?

So I don't know how many of these replies were done on the French side, but it could influence the total results.

The Chair: Okay. It's interesting, because (a) and (b) were so very clear, and then they got shaky.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Yes, because...was a “yes” a “yes” or was it a “no”? And so on.

Mr. James Robertson: I see your point.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Yes, (c) and (d) are, because of the way they can be interpreted. I mean, (d), what bill doesn't involve government spending?

The Chair: Also naming things....

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Even at that it involves some money.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: It does. So it's a question that's not relevant.

The Chair: On number 6, we're just going to skim through this before we decide how we handle it.

The Clerk of the Committee: Just to mention something about this sentence, I think they mean that only a government bill can ask for the spending of money. Usually, they need a ways and means motion, and only a member of the cabinet can do that. So I think if there's a bill that asks for spending, it would have to come from the government, not a private—

The Chair: I don't think people answering this survey know that.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: No, I don't think so.

The Clerk: Was it what we implied? That's what I'm wondering.

The Chair: We don't have copies of the original questionnaire here, do we?

A voice: The question is there. The wording is there.

Mr. James Robertson: I agree it's an issue that different people could interpret differently, and clearly there was a difference between the French and the English. I accept the point that by the time you get to (c) and (d), you're not sure if “yes” means you want it to be considered or you don't want it to be considered.

So I think, on these ones in particular, it's more the trend than the specific numbers, one way or the other, and perhaps the clearest ones are the first two, and maybe the third one. But on number d), I think the fact that it's only 51% and there are some ambiguities there would lead you to not place a lot of weight on that.

The Chair: I find number 6 interesting. Even if we were to not decide to recommend every bill be votable, participants feel that two hours is enough debate in the House. That was good.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: But it also shows they make a difference between a bill and a motion. Because we were proposing a definite—

The Chair: But they were given only one yes or no box, so I don't know how you could separate that out.

Peter, you can't, can you?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: It's interesting, because I interpreted this to mean they're somewhat flexible, they would be willing to sacrifice the time before the House of Commons if they could become votable. That's how I interpreted the results of this, that they wanted it to be votable to the point where they would be willing to sacrifice on our debate just to get that. I suppose different things can be read into that.

The Chair: And I think this 100-signature process continues to be murky.

A voice: Yes.

The Chair: Do you support continuation of 100 signatures, yes or no? Fifty-nine percent said “no”; 5% said “no answer”; and 36% said “yes”. Again, that's 59% of.... It's probably the ones who very specifically have been involved in doing it.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Yes, but still it's 59% of those we feel are interested in the subject matter.

The Chair: Getting into a little stronger results, if you look at question 11:

(a) Would you agree to a limit on the number of private Member's bills and motions that each Member can have on the Order Paper at one time?”

It's 66%. That's probably in the next one.

• 1635

And the next one:

b) Would you support allowing each private Member the right to have one private Member's bill or motion made votable during the life of a Parliament?

Seventy-one percent said yes.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Madam Chair, can I just ask our researcher....

Were there any party distinctions in number 11 or number 12? Did you notice any trends in any way by party?

I'm wondering about 11 (a) and (b).

Mr. Peter Niemczak: For 11 (a), the three largest parties—the Liberals, Canadian Alliance, and Bloc Québécois—all voted the same. As to the Conservatives and the New Democrats, they basically split 50-50. The Liberals, Bloc, and Alliance—

Mr. James Robertson: So the three parties voted yes?

Mr. Peter Niemczak: Yes.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: They did?

Mr. Peter Niemczak: For 11 (a).

The Chair: That really would solve Bibiane's problem, because when your name is drawn, you'd only have one in the bin, so we would know which bill or motion was being discussed and we'd get lots of advance warning. We wouldn't have the dilemma of six or seven in there, or someone reading 20 in on first reading and throwing them all in there. It would make you pay a lot of attention to the bill you were putting in, and once it's drawn....

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: There seems to be something wrong with that answer because 50% of the two smallest parties would never account for 34%.

Mr. Peter Niemczak: No, there were still members of the Liberal party, members of the Alliance, and members of the Bloc Québécois who voted no.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I thought you said....

Mr. James Robertson: A clear majority of the three parties voted yes. Of the three larger parties, 60% to 75% voted in favour.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I misunderstood what you said.

Mr. James Robertson: Just on that point, Madam Chair, we didn't specifically ask them to limit it to one in 11 (a).

Mr. Pat Martin: That's what I was going to say, yes.

Mr. James Robertson: We set a limit on it, so that limit could be three or four...four, like with written questions.

The Chair: But not 70 or 80, which some of our—

Mr. James Robertson: That's right.

The Chair: I know one Liberal who puts in 80 at a time.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Does he get drawn?

The Chair: He never gets drawn.

So on 11 b):

Would you support allowing each private Member the right to have one private Member's bill or motion made votable during the life of a Parliament?”

Seventy-one percent said yes.

The next series is on private members' hours being allotted to recognized parties as reflected in the standards in the House.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Excuse me, I wanted to know on 11 b) as well if there were any trends by party.

Mr. Peter Niemczak: No. Almost every party voted in favour of that—

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Okay.

Mr. Peter Niemczak: —except the New Democratic Party, whose answers were split evenly among yes, no, and no answer.

The Chair: When you go through the series on 12, changing the hours, it appears nobody wants to really do anything. The way it's being done now seems to be what everybody is content with.

I like number 13:

Do you think that all votes on items of Private Members' Business should be scheduled at the same time each week?

Sixty-eight percent said yes. That's getting up there. So you could concentrate—every Tuesday you're doing private members' bills, and you could do your homework and make sure you understood what was going on.

Mr. James Robertson: It is not presently a problem because currently there are weeks when there are no votes on items of private members' business. If we went to a system where everything was votable, the chances are there could be, depending on the number of hours selected, two or three or more votes on items of private members' business each week. So therefore the grouping would be more relevant.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: It seems, though, that there's a clear indication that the members are willing to be flexible and increase the hours. Some are willing to come Fridays or Mondays or sit—

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Mostly it's to add an hour.

Mr. Peter Niemczak: For 12 (c):

Starting the House one hour earlier on some days

All the parties voted in favour of that. That was one of the questions where every party voted in favour. The only party that came close to doing a 50-50 split was the Bloc Québécois. The other parties were more in favour of it.

• 1640

The Chair: What do you mean by “more in favour”? In the 60% range?

Mr. Peter Niemczak: Close to the 60% range. There were a lot of “no answers” on this. So if you take away the “no answers”, 57% of the Liberals voted in favour of it and 22% voted no.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Could it be that they felt they had to choose between one of these three options when they answered, and so you'd get no answer? I talked to several members—this is just anecdotal evidence—and they felt they had to choose between one of these three options. So then you'd get no answer from them on the other ones.

Mr. Peter Niemczak: That's what it looked like on the survey results on some questions.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Yes.

Mr. Peter Niemczak: You could see where there was a yes-no option and a list of three or four other questions below it, and they would check one and skip on to the next question.

The Chair: Given what we have in front of us and given that you have a better breakdown, I have a question to the group. How would you all feel if we asked Peter, who is non-affiliated, non-partisan, and doesn't give a damn what we choose on this, I'm sure, because he works here—he doesn't have to go into the House and debate motions—to analyze....

Could we ask you to analyze, in your best judgment, if there are any strong trends or any areas of this that you think the surveys were strong enough and you had enough numbers to make a recommendation...bring them back to us, or send them—you don't even have to come with it—

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I think, Madam Chair, in all fairness to the task you're giving him, a strong trend would be a majority, wouldn't it?

The Chair: You are, I assume, a statistician. If you are going to...you're not?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: No. I think we have to give him some direction. We live in a democracy. If a majority of members...that would be a trend, especially when some didn't vote.

The Chair: All right. If you got one-third response, even discounting the fact that you're going to have 50 cabinet ministers and people in those positions who won't respond, then take those numbers and crunch them based on 250, would you be able to go through and pick out some clear recommendations in here that you think the majority of those in the House would agree with? Or is the sample too small?

Mr. Peter Niemczak: I don't think the sample is too small. We'd have to run the data and see if there is—

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Madam Chair, I am a statistician, and if you get a 100 you get a good response. That's fairly reliable. I know enough about mathematics to know that's a pretty good response.

Mr. Pat Martin: But this is a random sample.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: It's not a random sample. This is a good response, Madam Chair.

Mr. Pat Martin: But, no, it would have to be a random sampling to be statistically accurate. This is already biased by those who chose to answer. It already says something about them.

The Chair: And you had a majority who have been involved in private members' business, as opposed to—

Mr. Pat Martin: Yes.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Look at d).

The Chair: Which one?

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Number 15.

The Chair: See, I don't know where to go with this thing. I'm floundering here.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Look at number 15:

Have you ever tabled a private Members' bill or motion?

Sixty-nine percent said yes.

The Chair: So you have the private member's crew?

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That's what we said earlier. As far as I'm concerned, the ones who answered this are the ones who are interested in private members' bills.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Yes, right.

The Chair: And, you know what, they're the only ones whose responses we should be interested in.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Exactly.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That's what I'm saying.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Yes. There's your answer.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That's right. Even if 100% of them had said we think every member should have one bill a session, you would only get—

The Chair: Sixty-nine votes.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: —roughly 72 or 75 bills a year—

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Yes, right.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: —because they're the 72 or 75 people from the entire House that are interested in this.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Right, right.

The Chair: Conversely, if you have the most interested people responding, and of the most interested people, 62% want to make them all votable, a lot of people don't that do participate.

Mr. Loyola Hearn: That's not the way it should be. Our parliamentary system, generally, Madam Chair, dictates that those who participate in our democracy...we accept the results. If we're in the House this evening having a vote and only half or one-third of the people show up, we accept the majority. Here, in our own discussions, we talked about consensus earlier. If we had three or four more members of the committee here, the votes on the two bills today might have gone some other way. But we accept the majority of what we have, and here everybody had the same opportunity to participate—people did—on this issue.

The Chair: All right. So if we do a report that says we had roughly a one-third response; of that one-third that responded, 70% of them were participants in the process; 62% want to make all bills votable; therefore this committee recommends they consider making all bills votable, would that make you all very happy?

• 1645

Mr. Loyola Hearn: I have no problem with it at all.

The Chair: Do you?

Mr. Pat Martin: The NDP strongly feels—I've spoken to Bill about this too—that we will be resisting this at the House level too.

The Chair: My common sense tells me to resist it because I believe.... It's only my personal belief and I don't feel I should be giving too much of it, because I don't do private members' bills. I have one on the Senate I'd like to put in.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Did you answer the survey, Madam Chair?

The Chair: Yes, I did, and I have a rather vested interest in answering the survey. I believe in giving the people what they want. If they want them all votable, let them have it for six months and see what happens. But they are going to be very unhappy with it at the end of the six months.

Mr. Pat Martin: Darn right.

The Chair: Because none of the bills will be important any more; none of them will be featured; nobody will pay any attention to them. It will be a mass cattle call on voting one night a week. It will diminish private members' bills. That's my own personal opinion, and I think that's Bill's opinion, but—

Mr. Pat Martin: He's also worried about being forced to stand up and vote on some things that we just don't think should be.... There'll be some real whackos coming out of the woodwork, I'm sure.

The Chair: This is an interesting...let's talk.

Mr. Loyola Hearn: The way we're handling this affair now.... This is my first time sitting around the table, and it's an eye-opener.

Just going back to the two bills we discussed today, why did we not agree to vote for either one of them? Perhaps Pat and I voted against each other, because we wanted our own to get on. Government members voted against the vote, perhaps, because they didn't want a controversial debate. Those are not the right reasons for rejecting debate on issues that private members think are important for themselves or the country.

I'd rather have good private members' motions or bills debated, provided there's some way of regulating numbers. You don't want to trivialize the process either. But I don't think we're being objective in what we're doing here at all—for what it's worth.

The Chair: No, we are being subjective. I agree. But I don't think...except for the long gun bill, which I know the hell I went through on that in the first place. That's my own personal reaction. Except for the long gun bill, I don't think I've ever voted in a partisan way on any of these bills. I go on what I like. To be honest with you, I get funny looks from ministers on what we make votable in here. It's as if they're saying hey, Carolyn, how did you let that one go by. I don't worry about it. I don't vote as a Liberal in here.

I voted against long gun not as a Liberal—

Mr. Loyola Hearn: I'll take the bad day.

The Chair: No. I've been doing it—

Mr. Loyola Hearn: It's good to....

The Chair: —for years. But you get ministers saying, how the heck did you let that through. Hey, wait a minute. None of your business.

I've never said—and neither is Marcel saying—you guys better not pass that, because it's going to embarrass the government. That's not how we do it.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Madam Chair, I think that was an excellent comment, though. It's not our responsibility to screen out controversial issues.

Why do we play that role? I think Parliament is the place where they should be discussed and—

The Chair: Garry, I'd have been a lot happier if we'd had 78% saying make them all votable. I don't think this is strong enough. But if that's what you guys want to do, as long as we're allowed to put in the report—Mr. Guimond is being very quiet down there—that 62% of those who responded think all bills should be votable and the committee agrees with that, fine.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Yes, very good.

The Chair: But I don't want to give them the impression that 90% of those who responded wanted to make them all votable.

Marcel.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: We went ahead and distributed a survey. Everybody knows we're looking at a survey. Everybody knows we do not have the power to decide—

The Chair: That's right.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: —what we're going to do with this. So instead of debating on whether 66% or 76% or 86%.... I don't think the committee expects that of us. I think the committee expects of us that we managed and encouraged the conduct of a survey.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Right.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: I think what we have to do is turn the results over to the committee and say here's what the survey says.

The Chair: And don't put any recommendations.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Maybe we want to say we don't know how to interpret this, because there's only 66%—not even.

The Chair: We can send Peter and Jamie.

• 1650

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Of course. Obviously we expect to give them a recommendation in the sense that it would be the feeling—unanimously or otherwise—of six members sitting on a committee. Presumably we are supposed to be here to look at this objective to see if they are votable or not.

Now we have a survey that was conducted under our guidance, if you want to call it that way, but I don't think we are the ones to necessarily convince or influence the committee on how to interpret this.

The Chair: Thank you very much. Jamie has given me a suggestion. Number one, we could send a letter to Mr. Kilger, enclosing a copy of the survey results, and let him do what he wants with it with his committee.

Number two, we could then do a report to the procedure and House affairs committee with our recommendation, which gives us a little bit more time to think it through. We can give it a slant, if we choose to.

Mr. Guimond, I'm sorry, I interrupted you.

[Translation]

Mr. Michel Guimond (Beauport—Montmorency—Côte-de- Beaupré—Île-d'Orléans, BQ): Thank you Madam Chair.

I would agree with your last comments, particularly because of the change that could be made to some of the procedural rules in light of certain responses. Let me give you an example.

With regard to question 12(a), which discusses treating all private members' business on Friday, you may know that there is a request from our caucus...

Indeed, I imagine that colleagues from other parties are aware that Fridays, we're often talking to empty benches. This is not a partisan comment I'm making. I don't want to blame ministers for not being there on Fridays, but when we see 18, 19 or 20 absences among 25 ministers, we really have to question the relevance of even holding a session on Friday.

But this is not a decision for our committee. If we recommended, for instance, that private members' business be dealt with on Fridays and that we do nothing else, someone would certainly see problems with that. Apparently, there are some parties that aren't interested in changing the current procedure. That's the first comment I wanted to make regarding the Friday recommendation.

Madam Chair, when you suggested we submit our report without recommendations, I might lean towards that approach. However, let us not forget what led to this entire re-examination is that 100- signature rule which is really a complete mess. The 100-signature rule gave rise to the Bryden affair, for example.

A committee should take into account the fact that in response to question 7, 60% of our colleagues said that the 100-signature rule should be abolished. Once again, do we find that 60% is sufficient? I don't know.

Here's my second-to-last comment. I'm no expert in statistics, but I think that the sample we have... I remember having intervened twice in my caucus to try and get answers to my questions. When I saw that the deadline was approaching, I realized that there were only nine Bloc Québécois members who had responded. I undertook a questionnaire response blitz.

We members know what we are like. It is not necessarily negligence, but there are tons of documents that accumulate on our desks every day; there are the committees, the riding, colleagues travelling in the West who are jet-lagged. We are all members of Parliament and we know what kind of life we lead. In my opinion, the response rate is acceptable and sufficient for us to guide us in a decision, but not to provide us with an obvious answer.

Madam Chair, I will close with this: I don't know whether it would be a good idea for our two Library of Parliament researchers to prepare a report, within a short timeframe, describing what is done in other Parliaments of the so-called civilized world, in the British tradition.

• 1655

I imagine that this procedure is closely based on what is done in London, like so many other things. However, there may be other experiences elsewhere. Without writing a 50-page research paper—and you may not have time to do that—would it be possible for us to find out what is done in Australia, in the United States or France, which may suggest alternatives?

Thank you.

[English]

The Chair: That is an excellent suggestion, Mr. Guimond.

One thing you brought up was the 100-signature rule. We were told to come back with a suggestion. If you look at number 8, and go through (a), (b), (c), d), what you see is confusion. There are many interpretations of what signing a 100-signature rule means. Therefore, I think we should drop it. I think our recommendation to the procedure and House affairs committee would be that based on the fact that there were two many misinterpretations of the intent of the signature, we recommend you drop the 100-signature rule right away, because they're waiting for that. That's number one.

Number two, we send the full report to Mr. Kilger with no recommendations.

Number three, we have the researchers bring us back a summary of how it's handled in other jurisdictions and pursue it here after we pass this on to Mr. Kilger. Am I interpreting your direction?

Do we all have a degree of comfort with that? Because the specific purpose was whether we keep the hundred signature rule or not. By asking the (a), (b), (c) interpretation, you see mass chaos. So I think it's safe to say there is not a consistent view of what it means when you sign that. Therefore we recommend they drop that at this time.

Pat and then Marcel.

Mr. Pat Martin: I think I'm okay with the 100-signature rule. I think you're right. That's clear. But at the opening of this I think you mentioned that the numbers weren't as firm as you might have liked on the votability question. Why don't we go back to our caucuses and canvass them one more time on just that question.

The Chair: That wouldn't hurt to try to do that before we come back—the first Wednesday back. I know in our caucus we don't vote. But there was a survey taken on how everybody felt about electronic voting and somebody stood at the back of the room and everybody came back and they put a ballot in the box, so—I'm not supposed to talk about that. Because it was a complicated survey, we could do that before this report goes too much further. We could send these results to Mr. Kilger, which he's asked for. We could designate each of us as the person who does a yes or no survey. That's a straight question—yes or no.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Yes or no on what?

The Chair: Should all private members' bills be votable? Yes or no.

Mr. Pat Martin: I think that's the key question of this whole survey, really.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I don't care. What was the point of going through the last exercise for the last month? That really says we don't like what's happening here, let's redo it. Is that what you're saying?

The Chair: I don't think the results are clear. Does anybody in this room feel these results are overwhelmingly clear on anything?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I think they're clear that the people want the votable. It's clear. You get over 50%—

Mr. Pat Martin: Well, I know a lot of people who didn't vote in the survey who don't want it.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: But their responsibility is to participate. That's their problem.

The Chair: Let's go back for a second. The first recommendation is based on the series of interpretations on the intent of the 100-signature rule. Jamie, are you noting this? This committee recommends that the 100-signature rule be dropped—immediately.

Some hon. members: Agreed.

The Chair: Is there any disagreement? That's one thing we've accomplished. Again, it's only 59%, but these three pie graphs tell us there's confusion out there. So it's 59%, which is low, but it's also coupled with that.

Secondly, we respond to Mr. Kilger's request by sending out the results of the survey. Does everybody agree to that?

Some hon. members: Agreed.

• 1700

The Chair: We have two agreements so far.

The third agreement is that for our own edification, Jamie and Peter will see four or five democracies, ones that particularly pertain to Canada, and give us a quick synopsis of what they do.

Four—there is no four yet.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: On that point, it has no bearing on what we do.

The Chair: No. It's for further information. We probably should have had it today if I had thought about it.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: It could have a bearing on our recommendations, if there are any recommendations on our part.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: We're already sending it ahead. We're sending the survey.

The Chair: We're merely sharing results with Mr. Kilger because he has asked us to.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: There are two levels. One is Bob Kilger and the other one is the committee. Mr. Kilger is asking it for when? We're giving it to him June 1; here it is.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Here are the results of the survey.

Mr. Pat Martin: I have to get back—

The Chair: No, that's okay, I understand. Thank you for helping us.

Mr. Pat Martin: My pleasure. Goodbye.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Could you give me half a second before you leave, Pat?

Mr. Pat Martin: Yes.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: The question I wanted to ask is even though we didn't cover this in the survey, pushing through anything referred by the Senate, whether it be—

The Chair: I'm going to make a real—

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Could we make a recommendation or a question to say we're not comfortable with this?

The Chair: A question to Procedure and House Affairs?

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Could we please?

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Thank you.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I'll agree to that too.

Mr. James Robertson: If I could interrupt, I will explain briefly.

The difficulty is that the Special Committee on the Modernization and Improvement of the Procedures of the House of Commons is required by the special order of reference to report by June 1 to the House. It is composed of the five House leaders of each party, plus it is chaired by Mr. Kilger.

One of the areas they might recommend changes in is private members' business. Prior to making any recommendation, they wanted advice from this committee and a copy of any report. I think by providing them with a copy of the summary of responses, that is probably all we are capable as a subcommittee of doing at this point in time.

The Chair: At this time.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I agree.

Mr. James Robertson: We will indicate I think in the covering letter that the committee has agreed to recommend the deletion of 87(6), the 100-signature thing, just so they know and they can take that into account if they need to.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Along with our questioning of the Senate parachuting.

The Chair: I think it still leaves us an opportunity when we get back from the break, or whenever, to further pursue, with the basis of information we're going to get, making a strong recommendation one way or the other.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Are we being told that if we wait until after June 1 it doesn't matter what recommendation we make, it will be too late?

Mr. James Robertson: No.

The Chair: No, and I'll tell you why.

Sorry for interrupting you, Jamie, but it's a pet peeve of mine.

We have reviewed private members' business twice under my chairmanship and both times we brought recommendations in, like the 100-signature rule, and they're changed on the spot when procedure recommends it. So if they bring in a series of recommendations and we don't agree with them, we can still go after having it changed completely.

What I'd really like to do, and I know you don't want to reinvent the wheel, but I'm wondering if you could go with a clipboard with a list of all your members and get a yes or a no from each person with one vote per person. You can share it with us, or not share it with us, and if we all do this in our own caucuses, that way you'd get 301 responses.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: As long as we don't violate their confidential rights.

The Chair: No.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I think we have to be very careful there, because we protected their rights here and now we're violating that confidentiality.

The Chair: Why don't we just leave it the way we've done it? Why don't we just suggest we're going to get more information, and if we want to make a strong recommendation then we can? But right now, we're going to pass the survey as it is to Mr. Kilger's committee. We're going to recommend strongly to Procedure and House Affairs on Tuesday morning when we come back that they drop the 100-signature rule based on this survey.

Number three, they're going to get more information that Mr. Guimond has asked for, and number four, we will reconvene and continue the debate.

Mr. James Robertson: Procedure and House Affairs' request to this committee was to recommend what to do with 87(6), the 100-signature rule, and the latest deadline for that, which is not carved in stone but is there, is June 1. If we do that on Tuesday, May 29, we will have complied with our obligation to Procedure and House affairs.

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The Chair: Can you word a recommendation that includes the idea that there is difficulty in interpreting what a signature means, and therefore with a reasonable majority voting to delete it we agree that it should be deleted? Word it that way, and we'll take it to the committee on Tuesday, and I'll pass it around to everybody to make sure. That's the week of Tuesday, May 29.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Who will take it to the committee?

The Chair: I will.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: You're not going to be here.

The Chair: No, I'm not, you're right.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That's another consideration. If we were to go and do a survey in our caucuses, I'd have a problem because I won't be here.

The Chair: You are not going to be here either.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: No.

The Chair: Mr. Guimond is on that committee and he can move the recommendation if Jamie drafts it. Is that okay with you?

Mr. Michel Guimond: No problem.

The Chair: We'll all sign it and make sure everybody knows there is unanimous agreement of the committee.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: We'll sign it this week then.

The Chair: All right.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I'll volunteer for that, as official opposition.

The Chair: All right.

Mr. Guimond, we'll move that motion and you can go in there and raise the question of our discomfort with making all Senate bills votable.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Yes.

Can somebody send this to my office? Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Hearn, for filling in today.

Mr. Loyola Hearn: It has been my pleasure. I enjoyed it.

The Chair: When you have a small committee you all get to jostle a little.

Thank you, Garry.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Thank you.

The Chair: I knew you were suddenly thinking somebody told Mr. Hearn.... I remember you and I were talking about it in front of him and I wanted to make sure. I wouldn't have discussed it with anybody.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: You were very clever at getting out of that, Madam Chair.

The Chair: I didn't say anything to anybody.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: That's okay.

The Chair: Are you kidding? I value my life.

Thanks very much, everybody. Thank you, Jamie. Thank you, Peter. This was total confusion for you, I'm sure.

The meeting is adjourned.