Routine Proceedings / Motions

Committee report

Journals pp. 773-5

Debates pp. 8925-6

Background

When the House reached Motions during Routine Proceedings, the Speaker expressed certain reservations concerning the proposed motion of Mr. Howard (Skeena) to concur in the sixth report of the Standing Committee on Transport and Communications because the report itself appeared to go beyond the committee's order of reference. The committee had been given a bill for study; the sixth report did not contain the bill, but, instead, made recommendations of a substantive nature based on its consideration of the bill. The Speaker added that "there [was] no precedent to substantiate the proposition that concurrence in such a report can be moved so that it can be the subject of a debate in the House". Members were invited to present their views and offer their advice to the Chair.

Issue

Can a motion for concurrence be moved if the report contains recommendations beyond the committee's order of reference?

Decision

No. The motion is out of order.

Reasons given by the Speaker

The Standing Orders provide for a substantive proposition to be considered by the House. This cannot be done, however, by way of a recommendation from a committee studying a bill. "... there is no authority to support the contention that a committee of the House when considering a bill should report anything to the House except the bill itself." The recommendation, which should probably be relevant to a clause of the bill, would have been more properly introduced to the committee as an amendment to that clause.

Sources cited

Journals, February 16, 1971, p. 333.

Beauchesne, 4th ed., pp. 244-5, c. 304(2); p. 287, c. 414.

May, 18th ed., p. 494.

References

Journals, December 13, 1973, p. 745.

Debates, December 13, 1973, p. 8695; December 20, 1973, pp. 8921-5.