[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
Tuesday, February 11, 1997
.0936 
[English]
The Chair: Order. We're missing a couple of our members, but we had wanted to continue with the clerk.
I was doing some interesting reading over the weekend. Our researcher provided me with Hansard, a discussion about the Standing Orders on consideration of the business of supply. The same dilemma we're facing today was being debated by the Honourable Stanley Knowles and various other eminent people on June 26, 1973. In 23 years, nearly 24 years, it hasn't been resolved. So it's not surprising if we're taking a bit of time with this particular item.
We had asked Mr. Marleau back to see if we could get further clarification and perhaps discuss some options with him.
Let's go through the procedure on that last day of the business of supply. There's a motion to concur from the government. As far as I can see, it has to be moved because it's the first time the estimates have formally been put before the House for debate. I don't see how you can dispose of that.
The question then becomes how you get debate on opposing points of view or possible amendments to the estimates. You may have before you reports from committees that propose reductions in the estimates. If so, and if the minister doesn't accept them - and normally the minister would not accept them - the minister will then lay down a specific vote of concurrence in that particular report, which deletes the committee's report from any consideration.
Am I understanding it right so far, Mr. Marleau?
Mr. Robert Marleau (Clerk of the House of Commons): No, at the moment, before concurrence in the estimates, if there have been notices of opposition to a specific estimate, the government puts a motion on the order paper to concur in that estimate. That will force debate on that estimate. If a committee has reduced the estimates during its study, the government would then put a motion on the order paper the same day for debate within the guillotine period to reinstate that estimate, if it so wished.
The Chair: The problem then comes because at the end of that day, at 9:45 p.m., all the motions are put, and in general the only motions on the floor then are the government's motions. What we want to try to do, I think, is to find a way of getting, at a minimum, the committee reports, whether it's for reallocation as we're recommending or for reduction in estimates, on for debate. Do you have any magic answers for how we can do that?
One of the problems I see is having just that one day, because notwithstanding Mr. Williams's argument, the allotted days are specifically for the business of supply, and if the opposition chooses not to use them for the business of supply, I'm not sure what we want to do.
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The only way, it seems to me, is to have other days that are specifically set aside so you may only deal with a motion on the estimates, although that was the intention of the allotted days very specifically, to deal with the business of supply. As we all know, that's not the way they're used. I don't know that we can solve this problem in any meaningful way when we've got 20 days now for the business of supply and there's really only one day that actually gets used for the business of supply.
Mr. Marleau: I think that depends on your interpretation of what is supply. Standing Order 81(7), if that's the right number - I'm looking at the annotated version - does provide that the concurrence of a report of a committee on estimates, where it's for reduction or negatived in estimates, can only be debated on a day of supply. So the opposition has an option to move as the debate for the day the concurrence of a committee report on supply. I don't think you can enforce that. As you say, it's up to the opposition to make that choice. It's Standing Order 81(9) now.
The problem with a day that is guillotined under the Standing Orders is, how do you reach at specific items of interest, be it a reduced item by a committee or a specific item in the estimates that a committee might want to see pursued on the floor, when you only have that one day and a series of procedures, the initial one of which could take the whole day's debate, getting in the way of getting at the specific debate? I think the conundrum you have is how much you want to focus on that final day for a specific debate where you may have quite a buffet before the House, and how much you want to make committee review of estimates more effective, ultimately translating into some action by the House.
I think we've had debate over the last 25 years. We can pick several days on the last allotted day or on concurrence of the estimates of a specific estimate, whether it's the budget of the Senate or a particular government agency. Certainly, opportunities for debate for the opposition are set and those opportunities for debate are pretty clear in the established practice.
If you want to move to committees being more effective and using the reallocation that you identified as a possibility, then maybe you spread that impact on the estimates over all of the 20-some-odd standing committees, which could translate into one or maybe two issues that would come to the floor of the House on the last allotted day.
Let me explain why it is possibly not a magic solution. I think we can draw a parallel between the initiatives the government took in this Parliament on the referral of bills to committees before second reading and, in conjunction with that, the standing order that provided for amendments to such bills to come forward that might require a royal recommendation; in other words, amendments affecting the financial prerogative of the Crown. But the bill would be allowed to progress through the House up to and including third reading.
We had a case of a private member's bill that was adopted under those conditions, and the government chose to come forward at the appropriate time, third reading or before, with a royal recommendation supporting that. In other words, a private member took an initiative that would have consequences on spending. The government rallied to that initiative by supporting it, by obtaining from the Governor General a royal recommendation.
I think you could create a parallel with the estimates on reallocation. In other words, I suppose there are two options. The first would be entirely government controlled. I'm not sure you would want that one as a committee, but that's up to you to decide. On the tabling of estimates every year in March, before March 1, the Treasury Board minister could table a royal recommendation, a blanket one along with that, that would say something to the effect that committees will be allowed to reallocate a portion of the funds, a percentage - whatever percentage you might deem to be both saleable and proper. That's one option.
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That's entirely an initiative of the government and not the House or a committee. In other words, it's a little bit like the government saying you have permission.
The other option would be to adopt a set of standing orders parallel to the ones I alluded to for bills, whereby a committee couldn't make amendments, and reallocate whatever percentage you decide - 1% or whatever - and introduce a slightly new motion if a committee reallocated, let's say, a portion of the government's departmental spending within that envelope at the time of the concurrence of the estimates. The government could do two things. It could move a motion to concur the estimate as it was originally; move a motion for debate to restore the allocation; or move a motion to reallocate those funds. So the committee would have reallocated and then the House - it has to be a government initiative because it's the financial prerogative of the Crown, after all - would move a motion in that list of concurrence motions to reallocate those funds, based on the committee report.
The committee action could proceed right up to that point, and then the government would have to decide what to do on the final date, the same way it would have to decide right now on a reinstatement. If you negative an estimate, it has to think it through. If it does nothing, it's gone. If it doesn't move a motion to reallocate, then it won't be reallocated. The committee will have done its job. The pressure of the committee, the recommendations, the evidence, will all be there. You could ultimately take it right down to a supply bill and say the royal recommendation must come in before third reading of a supply bill.
We'd have to articulate that in more detail. I think the supply bill is a little late in the process because of the guillotine and no-debate provisions on most of the supply bills we adopt.
That's not a magic solution. It's inspiration from the existing Standing Orders and what's been done to bills before second reading in this Parliament.
The Chair: If my colleagues will give me just one more minute, my sense is we want to make sure those committee reports have some priority in debate in the House; in other words, they're not always superseded by a government motion and therefore never debated.
Is there any reason why the government has to put down a motion to reinstate? Could it not take the committee's report as the committee's report and move a further amendment for whatever it wanted to do?
Mr. Marleau: It could. The confirmation of reallocation by the House is really what we're looking at here, supported by the government since it has the financial initiative. It could take the form of a concurrence of a committee report.
The Chair: It would have a choice.
Mr. Marleau: Yes. We could draft it in a form that says ``pursuant to the report adopted by...the estimates are reallocated accordingly,'' or something to that effect, which would give credit to the committee effort. That's a matter of wording, I think.
You can't get away from the fact of the Constitution. We're not just talking about Standing Orders. The Constitution gives the government, the ministry, the absolute financial initiative. We can't find any magic formula, short of a constitutional amendment.
The Chair: Mr. Montpetit.
Mr. Camille Montpetit (Clerk Assistant, Procedural Services, House of Commons): I'd like to add something to explain the procedure as it exists now vis-à-vis what we refer to as opposed items.
The procedure we have respects the government's financial initiative. In 1968, when these Standing Orders came into effect, the House agreed that once the committees reported their estimates - as is, reduced, or rejected - a global motion moved by the government would then be proposed to the House to counter those estimates. The main estimates will now be concurred in, contrary to what existed before, where the Committee of the Whole, which was referred to a committee of supply, had to go through each item, the same way the standing committees are now doing.
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The proposal adopted by the House was to have a global motion, but in order to allow a specific debate on any of the items in the estimates, the rules also allowed members to request that a separate motion be proposed to the House by the government for that specific item. This is what we referred to as the notice of opposition or the opposed item. What's before the House cannot be the wish of the member for a certain reduction. What has to be before the House is the minister's or the government's motion, but on a specific item. Then the member or the House is capable of moving an amendment to that item to reduce the amount accordingly. It's never the opposed item that's before the House; it cannot be.
The Chair: The whole estimates are before the House. The opposed item is part of that.
Mr. Montpetit: The whole estimates are before the House, and there's the main motion concurring all the estimates - that's what I referred to as the global motion - but in order to have a specific debate, and especially a specific vote on a specific item, a member must give notice of opposition so that item is extracted from the main motion for a -
Mr. Marleau: All those are in the name of a minister. They have to be in the name moved by the President of Treasury Board and seconded by - they're never in the name of the member who's in opposition. The decision taken by the House is made on an initiative of a representative of the Crown.
The Chair: I wonder why we can't treat the estimates a little more like the bill, while protecting the royal recommendation. In other words, the motion of the government could be to concur in the estimates as amended and, if it wished to reverse any of those amendments, to introduce its own motions and put those motions before the House.
Mr. Marleau: I think what we were suggesting in committee was that you could have agreement to the estimates and you could have the reduction, the elimination, and the reallocation - that would be new - and you'd report that to the House. Then on the final day of supply, when the government puts before the House its motion on estimates, it could do restoration, reinstatement, reallocation, as may be inspired by a committee report - you can make that link that it has to be out of a committee report, not just a new reallocation the government has decided it wants to make but one that is pertinent to a committee report - and concurrence.
The Chair: Why couldn't the committee's recommendation for reallocation be put before the House from the committee?
Mr. Marleau: That's what I'm saying. Whatever the motion of reallocation, you could word the standing order that it must come from a committee report. In other words, it would not be one that an opposition member wishes to initiate at that stage or that the government wishes to initiate at that stage, but it would have to be inspired by a specific committee report.
The Chair: Monsieur Laurin, I'm sorry for taking so much time.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin (Joliette): Mr. Marleau, I would like you to provide us with some clarifications on the following situation. It appears that we are finding it difficult to change our procedures in order to make improvements. We are all aware of this. Historically, this has always been the case. Do the current Standing Orders enable us to make slight changes to the way that the House committees operate so that, in some cases, the House would be entitled to exercise a first right to veto a supply motion, such as is done in the municipalities?
.0955
In Quebec, the mayor of a municipality has the right of first veto, and can, for instance, veto the approval of the minutes. When a council meeting has taken place and the mayor disagrees with the decision made, he can exercise his veto power and delay the adoption of this resolution for a certain length of time.
Could we not have something similar so that when a committee is reviewing supply and recommends that an appropriation be amended, namely that it be refused or increased, that the House could exercise its right of first veto with respect to the adoption of this appropriation? Hence, if the minister wanted to maintain his appropriation, he would have to explain to the House why he is refusing to follow the recommendations made by the committee and why the appropriation in question should be maintained. Do the current Standing Orders enable us to take such an approach and do you think that one can defend taking such an approach, given our parliamentary tradition or culture?
Mr. Marleau: My answer is yes to both of your questions. In essence, our procedures already allow for this. A committee may decrease the estimates or reject them outright and, at the last stage, the minister may, in the House, use a type of veto power because he can initiate the motion to reinstate them. If he does nothing under these circumstances, the ball starts to roll and the estimates are amended. But he can reinstate them.
The only difference between this situation and the one I referred to earlier with Ms Catterall, stems from the reallocation of funds under a budget item, which does not exist right now and which, moreover, cannot exist given our procedural and constitutional culture, because the initiative to spend money, to set objectives, determine qualifications and conditions resides with the government's side. This is where this issue of reallocation of supply becomes a bit more complicated.
But if the government does nothing, if it does not state, at the last stage and through a royal recommendation, that it is in agreement with what the committee has suggested and supports it, these reallocations recommended by committee will not have force of law.
Mr. Laurin: I do not understand. If the minister says that he agrees with the committee's recommendations, will they be adopted?
Mr. Marleau: If the minister is in agreement and tables a motion in the House to reallocate the funds based on the committee's report, there is no problem.
Mr. Laurin: I see.
Mr. Marleau: But if he is not in agreement, he doesn't have to do anything. He can simply ignore the committee's report. Because the recommendations are not sanctioned by the Governor General, they will not have force of law.
Mr. Laurin: Do we need to amend our current Standing Orders to compel a minister who disagrees with a committee's recommendation not to ignore the report, but to justify his opposition? What do we need to do to compel a minister to do this?
Mr. Marleau: You must state your opposition to the appropriation, as already provided for under the Standing Orders. On the last day, you issue a notice of opposition to this vote because the government does not want to take action, and the appropriation is debated.
Mr. Laurin: It is not necessarily debated?
Mr. Marleau: You want to put the government in a situation where it must introduce a motion to adopt the vote and justify its opposition to the report that a committee may have made on the reallocation.
The problem that you have with the debate, is that it takes place on the final supply day, and the first, second or third motion on the list may block the debate on the vote in question.
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Mr. Laurin: In other words, for all intents and purposes, the debate on this vote may never take place because there is not enough time.
Mr. Marleau: But there is a vote.
Mr. Laurin: But when we just have a vote, we don't get any justification.
Mr. Marleau: The frustration you are feeling today with respect to the review of supply, not to mention the authority to make reallocations, does not disappear because of this last supply date, and the choices that you must make in a day which, on average, comprises six hours of debate on the recommendations of 22 committees of which 12 may have made reallocation recommendations.
Mr. Laurin: I'm not sure that I have understood you correctly. You seem to be saying that the government could postpone, to the last day...
Mr. Marleau: No, not postpone to the last day, but you have the last supply day in June to record your notice of opposition to certain votes.
Mr. Laurin: Can we not do this before?
Mr. Marleau: Yes, you can do this before. You can chose an opposition day at the start and debate a committee report on estimates. The Standing Orders has allowed this for a very long time, but I cannot recall there ever being a debate on this.
Mr. Laurin: What would prevent the opposition from moving, for instance, a motion on a vote that it would like to reallocate at the beginning of the 20 supply days? Is the minister entitled to postpone study of this motion to the final day to avoid debate?
Mr. Marleau: No, as I explained to you last week, the opposition has a great deal of latitude in the choice of subjects that it wants to deal with on opposition days. If you wish to debate the vote pertaining to port facilities in Quebec City, such and such a heading in the Blue Book on estimates for the current year or the next year, you are quite free to do so.
Mr. Laurin: What provision in the Standing Orders stipulates that during the last date, we can no longer debate the issue of vote reallocation?
Mr. Marleau: On the last day, at 9:45, all of the questions must be voted on without further debate. When the session begins, let's say a Thursday at 10:00, the House may have six motions or notices of opposition to its votes before it, which means that the six motions have been sponsored by the minister to adopt these votes.
The first motion may deal with any subject whatsoever, such as the Senate, as we saw the last time. You can spend the entire day debating this topic. Nothing compels the House unless the debate comes to a halt, from going on to the next point, which may be something dealing with the reallocation. If you spend the entire day debating the issue of the Senate, the vote containing a reallocation will never be debated.
Mr. Laurin: What would prevent us from debating this issue before this final day?
Mr. Marleau: It is what I told you earlier. If you wish to set aside one of your days in order to discuss a specific vote or a report in which a committee has suggested a reduction or a reallocation, if the Standing Orders have been amended to allow this, nothing prevents you from doing this. This must take place on an opposition day. This procedure, which enables you to debate a committee report on estimates, has existed for a very long time, but the opposition has chosen not to use it.
[English]
The Chair: So we could have a motion saying that half of the allotted days have to be dedicated to a motion on the business of supply.
[Translation]
Mr. Marleau: One of the solutions we referred to last week would be to impose a time limit on each of the motions debated during the final day.
For instance, I told you that you could decide to allow so much time for the opposition's motions and motions for concurrence with respect to supply and so much time for bills. We could play around with the last day by determining how much time we would spend on each item depending on the number of motions presented. We would therefore be avoiding a debate that would block the others.
Mr. Laurin: Before choosing anything else?
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Mr. Marleau: We could go about doing this in several different ways. For example, we could decide to hear from one critic per party on each motion in order to establish the positions and to hold a vote at the end of the day. There are all kinds of formulas that we could use to guarantee that a minimum amount of time be given to questions before the House on that day.
Mr. Laurin: I do not think that the problem stems from the number of days that we have in order to discuss these issues. Once again, the whole problem arises from the committee's power to suggest any changes whatsoever.
Mr. Marleau: Right now, you have the power to reduce or turn down. You have this power. When you report to the House and the government does nothing, the votes are adopted as amended by the committee. For the time being, you do not have the power to make reallocations.
Mr. Laurin: Yes, but this power has no binding effect. The committee could suggest or recommend a reallocation. If the minister does nothing, everything is alright, but the minister can do something.
Mr. Marleau: If you're referring to allocation, this is another matter. The committee's power with respect to refusing or reducing a vote is binding. You drew a similar parallel in the case of the mayor who has veto power; the committee makes a binding decision and the minister can exercise his veto before the House, subject to a vote by the House.
Mr. Laurin: Alright.
English]
[English]
The Chair: Mr. Pagtakhan.
Mr. Pagtakhan (Winnipeg North): Let me be clear about that, Mr. Marleau. If the committee recommends a decrease or a total rejection and the Crown does not do anything, what prevails?
Mr. Marleau: Essentially, it is a House decision that the estimates be concurred in as amended. There will always be a final concurrence motion in the House.
Mr. Pagtakhan: That's right. In other words, before the vote on the final, global concurrence motion, at that point, in effect, what is before that is the decision of the committee. But if the government does not do anything to the specific decision of the committee, the decision of the committee prevails. However, at the time the global concurrence motion is put to the vote, the result of the vote will determine the final decision.
Mr. Marleau: No. Before you get to the global motion on the estimates, the minister will have the opportunity to reinstate.
Mr. Pagtakhan: And if he does not, what happens?
Mr. Marleau: Then you're on the global motion with the estimates, as amended, with the committee decision standing. He must take that initiative to reinstate.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Okay.
Mr. Marleau: If he does not take that initiative to reinstate, the global motion will then read that the estimates be concurred in as amended, and ``as amended'' means amended by the committee.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Okay. It's very clear now.
What is the reason for reinstating? In other words, it may have agreed in part to the amendment in substance, but is it not because of the convention that if you change any component of the global concurrence motion, there is in fact a loss of confidence?
Mr. Marleau: That, again, is for the government to interpret. Why it chooses to reinstate a specific estimate is probably more rooted in what program was targeted and what the consequences of the reduction might be. The government may ultimately choose to make it a matter of confidence, but it need not.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Okay.
Mr. Marleau: We've had similar proposals where just to force a vote, once upon a time, you would reduce the item by one dollar. That's the force of debate: get to the issue. If you had the opportunity to reject the whole thing, you probably would. But the one-dollar amendment is usually made to force a debate and a vote of the House. Even on a one-dollar amendment, it could be an issue that the government feels is a total matter of confidence because it's the core of the government's platform or because of its position with respect to the budget, or whatever.
Mr. Pagtakhan: The ability of the committee to make reallocation could potentially automatically create a situation where a consensus or compromise, whatever we call it, reached at the level of the cabinet, between departments, is being threatened. Who knows? We have never been inside, but very likely, intuitively, something happens inside wherein it's ``no, you cannot have that, but you can have this''. So at the end of the day, each department has a total budget.
.1010
To have reallocation between departments potentially could be very difficult, even if I agree to the principle of reallocation -
The Chair: Rey, before we get too far down this path, what is being suggested is not reallocation within departments but that the environment department, for instance, could reallocate within the votes related to its department only.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Oh, so it's really intra-departmental. Okay.
The Chair: But this debate introduces an interesting question. If we have an estimates committee that has responsibility for estimates beyond a single department, could it do so?
Mr. Pagtakhan: My suggestion would be if ever we have to have any recommendation on reallocation, it should be within the department, for the reason that -
The Chair: That's what the recommendation is as it stands now.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Otherwise it would be again a very negative thing.
Mr. Marleau: I think we misunderstood your recommendation, or your thoughts on the recommendation -
Mr. Pagtakhan: Intra-departmental, and it has to be made clear if we have two.
In essence, whenever I look at this, it's a question of whether any change is a change or a matter of confidence. But the member is indicating why not force the government to explain?
The Chair: That what it's for, to do that - and they are not using it. I think we should chastise them a bit for that. If we're going to chastise the government for over-using confidence, we should chastise the opposition.
Mr. Pagtakhan: That's my view, that perhaps it's really for lack of a full understanding on the part of all of us that we are not able to utilize fully the procedures that are there to have reasoned debate on any item, the way I look at it now. Reallocation is another story altogether.
How about the vote of confidence on any given...is there any merit to that, from your procedural perspective? It's automatic unless deemed by the government.
Mr. Marleau: You would find it very difficult to write into the Standing Orders any definition, binding or non-binding, on confidence, simply because it's non-enforceable in a procedural sense. It's not the Speaker's prerogative. Confidence still lies with the government to decide what it chooses to resign on. Ultimately that's it. It's not what it loses in the House of Commons that is ultimately confidence, it's what it must resign on or chooses to resign on.
Mr. Pagtakhan: From your experience, would you agree that to remove that prerogative from the government of the day, majority or minority, would in fact transfer that prerogative to the Speaker of the House, in essence, because ultimately he may have to rule on what is an issue that has a confidence or non-confidence basis? Is that right?
The Chair: He can't, Rey.
Mr. Marleau: It's removing the prerogative from the head of state, the Governor General. Ultimately the Governor General takes the advice of his Prime Minister on the issue of whether his government can survive a series of votes in the House of Commons. That's where it lies, and -
Mr. Pagtakhan: I see that.
Mr. Marleau: - you can't transfer it to the Speaker.
Mr. Pagtakhan: No, I said if one were to pursue, as had been written before elsewhere...the way I look at it is that ultimately if somebody says, well, let the House decide...well, you know....
Mr. Marleau: I'll go back to my statements of last week. What you're doing is a fundamental change to our parliamentary system -
Mr. Pagtakhan: I agree with you.
Mr. Marleau: - going from government in Parliament to government by Parliament. You're getting closer to what I would call the congressional system in the United States. I think in terms of balances and checks you would have to have the Governor General with maybe a veto power over such a decision of the House, should he choose to exercise it, much as you have the President of the United States exercising veto decisions over decisions of Congress and vice versa. Otherwise you just couldn't govern.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I have one last point. Motions during the allotted days, as they now stand, are deemed, at least we know, automatically a vote of confidence. At least the government has more or less consistently interpreted it that way.
Mr. Marleau: Federal governments, yes.
Mr. Pagtakhan: During those allotted days motions coming from the opposition, of course, would usually be motions of condemnation. If the motion does not condemn the government, is there merit in pursuing a modification of the tradition of a vote of confidence?
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Mr. Marleau: We have had several motions in opposition in recent history that were not votes of confidence.
Mr. Pagtakhan: But they were still deemed as such.
Mr. Marleau: They were deemed by the government, because they were on supply days and votable, and it must exercise its control on supply or the issues related to supply.
Mr. Pagtakhan: The motion I can recall was one I introduced - not knowing that was the tradition - that the House recommit itself to universal medicare. I was surprised the then government said it could not vote for that, although it believed in it. To a layman, it's hard to explain. Of course, the government voted against it.
Is there an opportunity in procedure to clarify that kind of situation?
Mr. Marleau: There's just the opposite. We had situations where the government voted for something -
Mr. Pagtakhan: And then what happened?
Mr. Marleau: - and said it didn't think it was confidence. I think Doug Lewis, as the House Leader, got up in the House just before the vote and said ``We're going to vote for this motion, Mr. Speaker, because we believe it's the right way to go and it's part of our policy, but it's not confidence''. So it wasn't confidence.
Mr. Pagtakhan: So it can be done.
Mr. Marleau: Oh, it can be done.
Mr. Pagtakhan: So the government of the day was wrong in giving -
Mr. Marleau: I can't say it was wrong.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Thank you.
Mr. Marleau: It chose that course that day.
The Chair: It's like ``I love you''. There's nothing right or wrong; you either feel it or you don't. If the government feels this is a test of the confidence of the House in its ability to govern, it says so.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Now I can see. I can use that explanation now. When a government of the day argues on a very positive motion and says ``we love it, except it's a vote of confidence'', you could really say it's speaking from the two chambers of the heart.
Mr. Marleau: A motion has many words. Sometimes the essence of the motion may not be something a government is against. It could be parts thereof that make it unpalatable for it to support.
The Chair: It could be the context.
Mr. Marleau: Or it could be the debate itself.
The Chair: It could say ``You're saying we're not doing enough for medicare, we don't agree with you and'' -
Mr. Marleau: It could be at the end, going into the debate, as my colleague says. In the morning it might think ``Hey, this sounds like a pretty good proposal, we might support it''. At the end of the day, with the luminaries of the debate over the House, the government might changes its mind and decide not to support this.
The Chair: What's the -
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: The issue of confidence is always applicable to the members of the party in power. If you were to ask the opposition if it had confidence in the government, it obviously would always reply no. When the government asks for a vote of confidence, it's to ensure that its own members still have confidence in it, because they want to have the majority.
Mr. Marleau: They are in the majority in general terms.
Mr. Laurin: Yes, that's right.
Mr. Marleau: But we have...
Mr. Laurin: It's different in the case of a minority government.
Mr. Marleau: Not necessarily. In England, there have been situations where the members of a minority government have tested the House and requested a vote of confidence. The members of several opposition parties voted in favour of the government. So it is not always a question that is applicable to the government side.
Mr. Laurin: You are right, there may be some exceptions.
Mr. Marleau: As Ms Catterall was saying, this depends primarily on the politics of the day and on the question before the House.
[English]
The Chair: It would be hard to believe from this debate that our real focus is not on picking apart the estimates but on trying to get members of Parliament to realize they should be trying to influence the estimates for next year before they get plopped on their desks. That's where they can have the most influence, and yet we are back to debating this.
Can you explain to me the purpose of Standing Order 81(19) on page 49? It reads:
- (19) Proceedings on an opposition motion, which is not a motion that shall come to a vote, shall
expire when debate thereon has been concluded or at the expiry of the....
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The Chair: They're designated allotted days motions, then.
Mr. Marleau: No.
The Chair: I think this relates to the last day.
[Translation]
Mr. Marleau: Seven days in this period and eight days in the following period.
[English]
The Chair: Yes.
Mr. Marleau: Of the twenty motions in a year, eight can come to a vote. To dispose, if you like, of those motions that do not come to a vote, normally you would put them back on the order paper -
The Chair: So this doesn't relate to the last thing.
Mr. Marleau: - after resuming debate. This allows the Speaker to take off the order paper because they've expired those that don't come to a vote. Otherwise they would continue to appear on the order paper indefinitely.
The Chair: I'm not sure how much farther we can go with this discussion. I think what people want to see is priority given to the ability to move and debate amendments, and particularly priority given to any reasoned committee reports that come forward with changes to the estimates.
I'm not sure how we achieve that if the opposition doesn't want to use the twenty days it has to put forward those motions and really have a good debate on them. There's nothing that would prevent them from putting forward a motion that dealt with three different estimates and changes they wanted to propose to those three different estimates.
It almost seems to me that if on the last day there's some way of giving priority to the work the committees have done, it would best serve our purposes here to try to get Parliament, and particularly its committees, to take their work on the estimates more seriously, and to find some way of ensuring that at least a couple of those reports get a reasonable amount of discussion and that the government had to justify why if it was not accepting the recommendations of those reports. Is that what we're trying to achieve here? I don't know how you can do all that in one last day.
Mr. Marleau: You have to draft Standing Orders that give a certain amount of time to committee reports based thereon, as you just described, or, if you went the reallocation route, give priority to those so that they're up front on that day and have a minimum amount of debate, whether it's one member per party on the committee and the minister, maybe an hour each, or half an hour each if you go to ten-minute speeches. You could structure it so that some of those are addressed.
The Chair: If the opposition continues to be irresponsible - and we were in opposition too - about its use of allotted days and does not focus on the business of supply, the only other option I can see is to add maybe two or three additional supply days that are devoted to committee reports on the estimates.
Mr. Marleau: You have to remember that the supply day subject is entirely set by the opposition or the opposition party's term. When you're talking about committee reports, which may be a majority report, it could be a unanimous report of the committee.
On the last day, any member can put a motion of opposition right now on supply; it could be a government backbencher. So the extra allotted days that you refer to would be made available to the opposition as opposition parties and not necessarily to committees who have made reports thereon.
The Chair: Maybe one of the things I would want to do is make additional days available to the House, not just to the opposition parties.
Mr. Marleau: That's what I was trying to say without taking a position -
The Chair: Am I out of line thinking of others here? I think that's what we're trying to accomplish.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin.
Mr. Laurin: I do not see the value of these three additional days because the government is entirely free to bring up any subject whatsoever at any time. When you get right down to it, am I not correct in saying that these days will be of greater benefit to the government than to the opposition?
.1025
It seems to me that the very principle underlying supply days is to give the opposition a chance to express its views. Why add three others? I think that the government already has enough latitude; it can study votes whenever it wants. Am I right in saying this?
Mr. Marleau: Or he may never do so.
Mr. Laurin: If he opts not to do so.
[English]
The Chair: I think what I'm trying to do here is not add to the government's power to determine the debate in the House but to in fact add to Parliament's committees the ability to set the debate in the House, or to have their work as the subject of debate in the House. As Mr. Marleau has said, if a committee report comes forward, it comes forward with a majority recommendation. That clearly represents a lot of work on the part of members of Parliament, but the hooker is that it might represent the opinions of only the government members on that committee and still be a minority report. Maybe we want to look at reports that have come forward with unanimous recommendation from the committee as those to be given priority for debate. I don't know.
Maybe we're just trying to micro-manage this far too much, but we are trying to give relevance to the improved work by the committees on the estimates. I don't see another way of doing that except by ensuring that their reports have some priority for debate in the House before the estimates are disposed of.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I agree that the allotted days for the opposition over a period of time have proved to be just right. To increase them would be something the opposition would love and something the government would not like. To decrease them would see things the other way around. I therefore think the number of days should remain.
As to the ability of the opposition to choose the subject matter, knowing the imagination of people, I think it will always be there, however restrictive we make it. When you put an amendment for $1, it becomes a matter for the estimates. So I don't think we should tinker with that any more.
As for adding an extra day without it being specifically for committee reports, again the opposition - or whoever, but likely the opposition - would make use of it in the same fashion, so it will not achieve the desired goal. If there has to be any change, they must in fact be designated committee days that may not be used if a committee does not want to use those days. In other words, call them by any other name but allotted days. We can't call them allotted days because right now allotted days means opposition days, right? This one would be a committee day, so it would be very clear.
Now, as to what there ought to be for the committee days and which of the various committees will decide that, this could be a very difficult thing to manage. Which of the twenty committees will have them?
The Chair: Maybe the answer is that the committee reports are there. I'm not suggesting reducing the number of allotted days. I do think, though, that in having acknowledged that they're not supply days, we should probably amend the Standing Orders to make it clear that they may be used to deal with the business of supply, or for any other subject that the opposition chooses to bring forward. But we should get rid of the pretence that these are days dedicated to the business of supply.
If we did want to look at a day or two for debate on committee reports on the estimates, it would seem quite reasonable to me that the opposition party might choose which of those reports gets debated, or that our new estimates committee might recommend a group.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Obviously, a committee report that is unanimous - unanimous in supporting the estimates - serves no useful purpose for debate. That is the global concurrence motion itself, right? But I think a unanimous report reallocating or decreasing within departments is something that is really worthwhile to pursue as, say, an approach pertaining to what we have now. To increase will again be really a vote of confidence, in a sense. To decrease the total, which would of course be for everybody, or to reallocate within the department before any given committee, assuming there is one department per committee, if there is unanimous support.... In other words, a unanimous vote on a given estimate, before a committee that at that point takes issue with the initial position of the government, should be provided with an extra day. It would provide for lively input from the citizenry.
.1030
The Chair: I have to leave in five minutes so I won't get a speeding ticket getting out to CJOH. You two can stay and carry on, but we don't exactly have an official quorum, because there are just two of you here.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I've exhausted my questions.
The Chair: Do we want to ask Mr. Marleau to do anything for us? I'm anxious to put this aside, to get on with dealing with this report, and get it off our hands, gentlemen.
Mr. Marleau: Madam Chair, may I make a comment?
The Chair: Sure.
Mr. Marleau: There is no difficulty in writing a set of Standing Orders in and around some of the issues you have raised procedurally. I think that can all be written up for the last day allocating time, etc.
Here, I'll just go back to some of the testimony last week. I know you're pressed for time, but I'd like to say this in your presence. What will bring back the members to your table to talk estimates? If you don't answer that question first, then all you're doing is rewriting the tail-end rules, out of which comes the present frustration. All you'll do is shift the frustration from the last hour to the first hour, or to the middle hour, in my humble view.
So what is it that will bring members of Parliament back to being interested in reviewing supply, in reviewing estimates, and in making reports to the House thereon? We know rejection doesn't work; it hasn't worked since 1968. Reductions have been very minor and have occasionally been extremely politically motivated either in a partisan sense or in the context of the day, but not for the review of supply.
Last week I said I thought you were on the right track on reallocation. I think it might create a dynamic to have members across the way form alliances, coalitions, objectives, in the review of supply. The back end that you've talked about for most of this morning is, in my view, just shifting the frustration around if you don't get back to the fundamental issue of bringing members back to the blue book with something there for them. As you formulate any requests -
The Chair: That's why we're focusing on this. Having the debate in the House, having the focus on their recommendations as opposed to the government's recommendations, might in fact be one of the tools that does it. That's exactly the question that I think we've been trying to answer for over a year now.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I would agree that it will not be.... It may be remembered within a given Parliament. Afterwards, it will be forgotten. I think really it will take the ability to reallocate, because each one has a priority as an MP. Hopefully, the collective priorities will come to a consensus. That is what is being tested here.
[Translation]
The Chair: Mr. Laurin.
Mr. Laurin: If we do not agree on a principle, we will get nowhere and it is pointless to continue discussing the issue in an effort to bring about change. Some basic changes must be made to the way that the committee in charge of reviewing supply operates.
If we're to get the members of this committee to discuss these issues, I feel that we must allow them to express themselves freely and not vote along party lines. This is a review committee. We are not reviewing issues on behalf of the Liberal Party or the Bloc Québécois.
Naturally, my principles are as deeply entrenched in me as yours are. The committee should enable us to make recommendations and suggestions and to convince our colleagues; this is a review committee that makes recommendations to the government. The government could then vote on the matter along party lines. Here, in the committee, if all the members were to have the feeling that their suggestions may result in an unanimous recommendation from the committee, we would be able to interest the members in coming back. Everyone would feel like they were of some use and provide us with their philosophical contribution on matters of fundamental importance.
The party line spirit will, of course, always be in the background somewhere. Making an official statement to the effect that members must feel free to express themselves freely without running the risk of any retaliatory action from their party would be the most modern approach to take as far as the running of this committee is concerned. Otherwise, we are talking for nothing. We will discuss this topic for another two months and we probably will not come up with any other solution.
.1035
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: On that point -
The Chair: Rey, I'm sorry, I have to go or I won't be there on time. I can officially adjourn the meeting and you can carry on the discussion if you want to do that.
I'll officially adjourn the meeting. You people can carry on this discussion as long as you want and report your results to me.
Mr. Pagtakhan: But then there will be no report. Is this an in camera meeting?
The Chair: Could we carry on as a subcommittee, with, say, Mr. Pagtakhan in the chair? Why don't I ask Mr. Pagtakhan to take the chair? The committee meeting can continue and you can report your results to me.
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): The only thing I would like to comment on is that personally, as a committee member, I have never felt compelled. I have always articulated the view I take as an individual member of that committee, of course knowing I have the philosophy of my party behind me. I think that's true for every member of Parliament. The past records of the committee indicate that I have done that.
But I think you are raising the point that if some members feel...there the issue is what message shall we give? Even if you say they are free, and if they continue to behave as they have behaved in the past, and that is to follow their political beliefs and by and large it will be the decision of a bloc of parties, it will be the same.
So I'm not so worried about that. But to make a statement that committee members should feel free -
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Mr. Pagtakhan, if you really feel that you're always free to express your opinions in the committee, why must the party in power be in the majority? Therein lies the basic question. If the party in power insists on having majority within the committees, it is because it absolutely wants to be able to defend the party's opinion and not that expressed by the members. If the opposite were true, we could have parity in committees and that would have no bearing whatsoever on party lines.
[English]
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): Yes, but then you're making a democracy defined as a democracy of parties, equal numbers, when real democracy means proportionate representation to that committee based on the number of members reflecting the parties. For example, if it would mean -
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: That is not what I said.
[English]
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): Let us say the current government, without any allusion to their performance. The Tory party is a party of two members. Are you telling me they should have a right to be in every committee equal to the right of a party like yours, with 54 members? It doesn't sound right, because the membership of your party will complain that a party of two will have far greater representation. Then it means members of Parliament indeed are not co-equal in the House. I think it defeats the very argument you have made of equal representation.
Is it not correct that representation on the committee is based on the number of members coming from any given political party?
Mr. Marleau: Yes, proportionate representation of the House parties is usually reflected in the committee composition.
.1040
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): So de facto, in other words, if the government of the day is a minority government, it may well be that in the committees we will have a minority of committee members on the government side.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: We could have a discussion in the hallway of the House of Commons and come to an agreement on this topic. If we were to have the same discussion, you, as a Liberal member and I, as a member of the Bloc Québécois, perhaps we would not be able to come to an agreement because we would have to defend the lines of our party. When I came here, I was under the impression that the committees were review committees.
When I discuss something with a member and tell him my opinion, I know in advance that my opinion, regardless of how good it may be, will never be accepted because of the party line. I have therefore talked for nothing; I have just preached in the wilderness. Although he may accept the fact that what I said makes good sense, he will never agree to it because his party line forbids him from doing so. This is what I don't like about the committee. If I'm to participate in a review committee, I don't study better because I'm red, blue or member of the Bloc Québécois. When I study, I tap into my common sense, my experience and my training. This is how I go about reviewing a problem and exchanging opinions.
After exchanging opinions, our committee could formulate a recommendation which would be reviewed by the House from another angle. It is at this moment that we decide whether or not the committee's recommendation coincides with the philosophy of each party and we vote on it. My opinion, as a member of Parliament, will have a better chance of being heard and of convincing others. Otherwise, this is not possible. Here in the committee, we always do a dress rehearsal of what will take place in the House; we test each other out here. This is what justifies the presence of a majority in the committee. When you have rehearsals in a theatre, you try to reproduce the conditions that will exist on opening night. This is what we are doing in the committee: we have a dress rehearsal the day before everything takes place in the House. Consequently, we know how everything is going to unfold; we say that there was a vote on division in the committee and that the same thing will happen in the House.
I've read reports on the usefulness and contribution of committees. They almost all come to the same conclusion. Members come to committee to pass the time. The party leader or the whip have far fewer concerns if they know the member is attending the meetings of the committee. On top of that, the member is less of a bother. He can't talk to the media while he is sitting at the committee table. He can't be doing anything else.
That's not why I'm here. I'm not here to waste my time, nor are you. We are here to voice our opinions from time to time even though they are always coloured by the philosophy our party has espoused. However, from time to time, we should be able to voice our opinions without feeling obliged, as happens when we're in the House, to accept a given opinion. In the House, I rally to my party's standard even if I'm not always in agreement on some philosophical points. As a general rule, I have espoused the philosophy of my party and when comes time to vote, I show solidarity. However, I would like to be able to express my personal opinions in other venues, especially the opinions that represent the views of my electors.
My electors have broadly espoused my sovereignist philosophy, which doesn't necessarily mean that they always agree with what I do. I'd like to be able to discuss that in some venue and be able to represent them. It's here, at committee, that the greatest democracy can be shown and where individuals can voice an opinion without glancing over their shoulders for fear of reprisals or being afraid of jeopardizing the party's philosophy.
I don't see any other solution. Otherwise, committees will keep on going as before and no member will feel that participating in a committee's work is an actual growth opportunity.
.1045
[English]
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): Although we obviously differ in some respects, we agree on a number of points. Really, truthfully, I feel free. On a personal level, I think the brief history that I've had in the House - and I was writing down a few things here, for example - when I have been able to achieve the unanimous support of the House on a couple of private motions...I was even able to support a motion on the excise tax that I did vote differently on when I was in opposition. I supported it not because it was a party position, but because I was able to see the beauty of that approach at this time.
In fact, I made an analogy to medicine. This was the case of the excise tax. I believed it would decrease tobacco consumption. But I also believe that even in medicine, if you give a drug that is good but at a point in time causes a side effect, if you continue that drug the patient may die. So either you withdraw the drug or reduce the dosage. So for me, then, my task as a member of Parliament was to speak to that issue in the context of that knowledge. In other words, I said ``Let us have a package''. A package was then presented, addressing the very issue: the decrease in taxes was creating smuggling, so let us increase them a little bit.
In addition, you have the educational component, the surtax and everything, or, in other words, the second choices of drugs to effect the same treatment, which is still to decrease tobacco consumption and not have the side effect of smuggling at the same time. In other words, if I am able to reconcile in my mind...but nobody told me that; it is a part of the sort of background I was able to apply when I gave an example. So I thought freely, but people were telling me that I voted because it was a government position and I was in government. I said no. I was able to find that reason within my mind. To me, it sounded like a common-sense approach.
Obviously, I can see your point. At this point, I would just like to say that a reallocation approach is a possibility. To me, there is no need to make a statement that members of the committee should be free to vote, because I have always voted freely.
In my view, the point that there ought to be equal numbers of opposition members and government members on any given committee subordinates a higher principle, which is the equal, proportionate representation of the individual members of the House who happen to belong to a particular party. To do otherwise would be to abridge the very rights of those individual members: the fact that they happen to be in a majority party becomes a penalty. How would they face their constituents who would ask why, if they belong to a government party, are they less privileged when sitting on a committee than if they were from a party of two? No Canadian would accept that proposition.
It's a very serious proposition to say that we must have equal numbers only because we have two blocs, the opposition and the government. If you say that is a plausible approach, what would prevent it...? Should it be limited only to the official opposition? How about a third party, a fourth party, or a fifth party that are equally in opposition?
Once we open up the thing about equal numbers on the committee based on party affiliation, we may in fact be defeating the very purpose of equal representation on the committee.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: In view of the nature of our discussions, I wonder if it's really necessary to keep Mr. Marleau here.
[English]
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): The interpreter is finished in five minutes.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I think the argument about proportional representation of parties isn't valid for committees. I'll give you an example. If there are ten of you against me and I'm alone, do your words have anymore value than mine because you're supported by other people and I'm alone? At most, it might mean that I shouldn't yell because there are nine of you. In terms of physical violence, you might be right because there are ten of you and I'm alone. But if we're speaking rationally, what I may be alone in saying can be just as well-founded as whatever the ten of you might be saying together. Numbers don't make what you are saying intelligent; the substance of what is being said is what matters.
.1050
I often get the impression that because of your majority in committee, a single one of you could express a view and when the time comes for the vote the others, who may never have shown up at any of the previous committee meetings could simply walk in and vote like you because they're toeing the party line: might makes right. I recognize the majority rules in the House, but if we maintain that in committee, we can't really think we'll be keeping up members' interest.
[English]
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): I agree with you, and I used the same argument when I was on the school board. The power of reason must always be about the power of numbers. That is almost contradictory to democracy, but in a democracy, hopefully, in every single number there is reason. So in that case, even the power of numbers against the power of reason prevails, but to say number is always without reason is not necessarily correct.
If I accept your thesis that the power of reason, which is my philosophy as well, is more important than the simple power of numbers, then you have nothing to fear as an opposition, being less in number, if you believe you have the power of reason. I think we sometimes interchange what we mean by numbers. Sometimes we think numbers are automatically without reason and reason is automatically without numbers.
I think I would be challenged. In all modesty, I happen to be one of the two out of seven who would always take issue. But remember, there is a greater number out there - the public - and it will see whether a given opposition, by definition fewer in number, is making sense.
We should always look at the public reasoning out there, particularly in public meetings of the committee. That is the real test of common sense. It is not what we believe; it is what the public out there will ultimately believe. That is makes sense.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Mr. Pagtakhan, that's what you have the opportunity of doing in the House. That's a principle that Quebec's Caisses populaires have understood. It's not the amount you have in your bank account that's the measure of your importance during a general assembly. Man or woman, it's one person, one vote no matter what your financial worth. We all know that financial worth gives prestige to a person and that the weaker argument might still win out because of one's personal fortune.
That's what I often feel in committee. Even a weaker argument has chances of being supported because of solidarity. It's not a real game. Things aren't fair. We know it's lost ahead of time. It's David against Goliath. Intelligence doesn't win the day: it's brute strength and strong-arm tactics. I'm not interested in fighting even though I do like to talk and wave my arms around. If I know it's lost ahead of time, I'd rather try to convince people elsewhere. This isn't the right venue.
I'd probably be more useful if I invested six hours in working in my riding rather than in committee. When I talk to my electors, I always do it as equal to equal and try to convince them that my ideas are good. On the other hand, no one is forcing them to share my ideas. Nobody comes along after me to tell them they have to think like Laurin if they don't want to be subject to reprisals. Here, in committee, we often feel that the member has to think a certain way, otherwise the party is being ill represented if the proper line isn't toed and solidarity isn't shown.
Committees aren't the place to act like that; committees are where the member's worth can be enhanced. That's where he plays his most important role. In the House, he's only one of 300 members. If I had to wait for my turn to speak, maybe I'd only speak once every four years.
.1055
That's what happens most of the time to most members on the government side. There are too many of them and they don't have time to speak in the House. They can speak elsewhere, but they can't say what they want and when they can say it I doubt that they're entirely free.
That's why I'm telling you not to look for different solutions. We must give members somewhere they can express themselves as representatives of their electors. We know the party will always be in the background. I think we'd be able to establish a fair balance for the member if he could express himself without having to toe the party line sometimes and if parties were to prevail in the House.
[English]
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): This subject matter would be an opposition day motion.
Thank you very much.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I know that very well. Mr. Marleau, as you're still with us, could I ask you if that's possible? Could we use the approach I've just set out without changing the Standing Orders? Is this just a matter for the parties or internal party regulations or does it have any impact on the Standing Orders of the House?
Mr. Marleau: This matter concerns parties first and foremost because, broadly speaking, your comment concern matters of party discipline.
I'd like to add that all the points that you have raised concerning the contribution a member makes to committee work are matters that surface often enough within the context of so-called procedural reform. They essentially impact on all kinds of matters that have nothing to do with procedure. For example, at the beginning of the 80s, the House tried experiments similar to the ones you're suggesting when it set up what were called task forces or working groups. These were very small committees very often made up of three members, one from each party. There was parity: you had a liberal Chair, a conservative member from the Official Opposition and a member from the NDP. They were given terms of reference to investigate poverty, free trade and all kinds of other matters.
In my opinion, you can't be absolutely for this equality or parity in committees in our system without taking into account the matter being examined by the committee.
In 1968, the House chose to send bills to committees for examination although this used to be the prerogative of the House. Estimates and no. 1 supply come under government orders. If you refer to the Order Paper you will find: "Government orders - no.1 - Supply". The initiative is the government's for that business of supply. So what you'd like to see as the member's role, a more democratic, more open and freer role, comes up against government practices that are fundamental to our system and that don't involve procedure.
What you're suggesting might be feasible in the context of an investigation in the absolute where, for the good of the nation, members get together around a table, examine a problem and put forth recommendations that might be an inspiration for government. That has already been attempted and has met with some success in the past. However, there is an incompatibility that might be insurmountable in what you are suggesting, in a context where a government has the mandate to govern and where the matters before the committee impact on that mandate.
[English]
The Acting Chair (Mr. Pagtakhan): It is 11 a.m. and the interpreter is about to leave us. I know the discussion has been very interesting.
The meeting is adjourned.