Committees / Committees of the Whole House
Chair’s statement: guidelines for the conduct of debate
Debates, p. 1090
Context
On June 23, 2011, the House adopted Government Business No. 3, a motion that provided for the consideration of Bill C-6, An Act to provide for the resumption and continuation of postal services.[1] The motion stipulated that the Bill would be referred to a Committee of the Whole. Noting that it would be the first time that many Members would be participating in such a debate, the Chair of Committees of the Whole (Denise Savoie) delivered a brief statement regarding the rules of debate for the proceedings.
Statement of the Chair
The Chair of Committees of the Whole: Order, please. I would like to open this session of the Committee of the Whole on Bill C-6 by making a short statement about the proceedings.
This is the first time many hon. Members will be participating in a debate like this, and I would like to explain how we are going to proceed.
The rules of debate are as follows.
No Member shall speak for more than 20 minutes at a time. Speeches must be strictly relevant to the terms of the clause under consideration. There is no formal period for questions and comments. Members may use their time to speak or to ask questions, and the responses will be counted in the time allotted to that Member. Motions do not need a seconder, and Members may speak more than once. Finally, Members need not be in their own seat to be recognized, just to make my job a little easier.
The committee will now proceed with the clause-by-clause study of the Bill.
Before we begin, I would like to ask those Members who have amendments to please bring them to the Table.
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