Public Accounts Committee on May 21st, 2024

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

While the clerk is....

[The Clerk]

Do you want the language, or is it understood?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

No, I think you had better send the language around to be safe and to go by the book.

I have Ms. Khalid on the list, and then Mr. Nater.

Ms. Khalid, are you ready to speak to it now, or would you prefer to see the text of the motion?

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I would prefer to see the text, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Okay, that's fine. That is your right.

I'm going to suspend for three to four minutes, depending on how long it takes, so just bear with us. We'll come back very shortly.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I call this very public meeting back to order.

Ms. Khalid, the motion has been sent to you and to all committee members.

Ms. Khalid, you have the floor.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair.

I appreciate the opportunity to talk about this. Quite frankly, I don't disagree with the intentions and the spirit of all of my colleagues at this table. In fact, the purpose of public accounts is to ensure that there is accountability when it comes to purses and how our public dollars are spent.

Chair, what these nine years as a member of Parliament have really reinforced for me is what we can do and what we can't do. The division of powers is significant.

We all know at this table that an active RCMP investigation is ongoing. We know for a fact that RCMP officers, or whoever the RCMP sends as representatives, will come to this table and say time and time again they cannot answer our questions because this is a public or ongoing investigation. Knowing that at the outset, why are we wasting taxpayer dollars to have this meeting in the first place? Why not wait until the investigation is over so that our committee can actually find out what went wrong and how we can provide recommendations to fix the process that went wrong?

As members of this committee, we do not have the right, or even the jurisdiction, to take over what is an RCMP investigation, Chair. We have to respect the division of powers and we have to respect the public purse, which is exactly why we have this committee in the first place.

When we're asking the RCMP to come here to talk about an open investigation, knowing full well beforehand that they cannot answer any questions on the public dollars or on an open investigation, either we're grandstanding on an issue and trying to take political points for whatever they may be worth or we just don't understand parliamentary procedure. I would credit all of the colleagues at this table with understanding what parliamentary procedure is.

At this point in time, I feel this is a waste of resources for us, knowing full well what the RCMP is going to come and say about an open investigation and its inability to answer any questions about it. For the RCMP to have to come and sit here and say again and again, “We can't answer. We can't answer. We can't answer”....

We know that after the investigation is over, we can have a thorough discussion on all of this. We can ask those questions and we can talk about procedure and we can talk about fixing how things are done and how procurement happens, etc.

How do we justify this? How do we justify political grandstanding right now?

Yes, I agree 100% that the RCMP should be coming to this committee to talk to us about how we can work to make sure that we are holding the public purse in the safety that it should be held in. That's the whole purpose of our committee. However, knowing beforehand that the RCMP is not going to be able to answer the questions we want them to answer, and still grandstanding.... I find that to be a little bit disingenuous, Chair.

Again, I have no opposition to the RCMP coming to this committee. I have no opposition to their coming and helping us understand how we can improve, but knowing full well that they cannot answer any questions and still inviting them anyway, while there's an open investigation going on.... I'm really not sure what we're trying to achieve here, Chair.

I'll stop there.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you.

Next is Mr. Nater.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair. I'll be brief.

I don't see any challenges in simply reissuing an invitation to our friends at the RCMP. These are law enforcement professionals. They know what they're doing. They know which questions they can answer and which questions they can't answer. If it will reassure folks, there's no problem with having a meeting, as it has been done in other committees, in which part of the meeting is in camera and part of it is in public.

There are a lot of questions out there, and I think the RCMP will answer what's viable for them to answer and decline to answer in public what they can't answer if it's an ongoing investigation. However, there are a lot of questions, so from our perspective, there aren't any concerns with reissuing a letter to invite the RCMP. We're not sending the Sergeant-at-Arms after them to compel them to come here; we're simply sending a letter to reinvite them.

I would say we support the motion, and go from there.

Thanks, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you.

I am keeping a list and I have four members on it.

Ms. Sinclair‑Desgagné, it's your turn.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

I think it's a shame that we're ultimately debating my original motion again. After all, the arguments we're hearing are the ones we heard before. There's absolutely no point in hearing them again. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police will be in a position to say whether or not they can answer questions. Many people, namely the public we represent, are wondering how an RCMP investigation works.

Of course, we won't receive answers about specific details of the investigation. It's up to us as parliamentarians to use our time wisely and ask other questions.

I don't see why we're even debating a proposal to simply invite RCMP representatives back.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much, Ms. Sinclair‑Desgagné.

The next speaker is Mr. Desjarlais.

You have the floor.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Like my colleagues from the Conservatives and the Bloc, I agree that it's a matter of principle, particularly as Parliament requires answers. To the point that Ms. Khalid made about the RCMP finding that they are unable to answer, I believe it's appropriate for them to be able to make that statement to the member who is asking the question.

It's important to know that we are not administrators in the same purpose for section 91 of the Constitution Act, which doesn't prescribe that we're making decisions for the purpose of the administration of government here; we're working for a Parliament that demands accountability. In this particular instance, the RCMP is involved in this work, and, should they be unable to answer a question from a member, they can simply say so.

The point of frustration that I have, Chair, is that the RCMP could be making the very same arguments, or not making the arguments, made by the Liberals. I think it doesn't do any harm to an investigation if we ask questions about their investigation and if they respond by saying they can't respond because of that investigation. If that's ultimately what they say, then that will be their submission to our report, but the options for the RCMP to decline the opportunity to even make mention of the process or their challenges or to say that they want to submit nothing are not present to vote on.

Chair, these are my final remarks on this issue. I hope that we have unanimous consent to do this, and I call for a vote as soon as possible.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Shanahan, you have the floor, please.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

I just want to point out—but I do have something to say on this motion—that I'd like the clerk to check the rules and procedures in chapter 20. I believe there's something about the chair's ruling being sustained when there is a challenge to the chair and there are equal numbers of votes. I'm being a good sport about this, but I think it's highly unusual for a chair to vote against his own ruling, and I'd like to see that further investigated.

I have something that I want to say about this motion before us, because I find it—I'm sorry—very disingenuous. We've discussed this before, and I think that we need to be mindful, as members of Parliament, of protecting the integrity of the investigation. I don't think anyone wants to see the investigation compromised, so I propose the following amendment.

I think we have to delete the last line—“within three weeks of this motion” and add “in order to protect the integrity of the investigation, that the RCMP appear after the investigation is concluded”.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I'm going to ask you to send that to the clerk right away.

I'm going to suspend for one minute. The clerk is merely a mortal—a super-mortal, like the rest of us—but I'm going to have you send that amendment, and because she's presently occupied, I'm going to suspend for a minute.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I'm bringing the meeting back into session.

Mrs. Shanahan, we have received your amendment and we've sent it out to all the members. You have the floor again.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

Again, in keeping with the spirit of the meeting, I think we have been open to hearing testimony from the RCMP, but the very last thing we want to do.... I don't think there's any member here who wants to interfere with the investigation. We can see a scenario in which the accused are in court and they're going to point to information that was given by the RCMP out of turn. I'm not a lawyer myself, but I can imagine somebody would have a field day with that kind of public testimony.

I don't have the original letter, but I believe we did seek to ensure that was with the RCMP. We acknowledge that they have their job to do and that it's important to do. That is why I'm putting forward this amendment; it's because our report won't be done.

Once the investigation is completed, the RCMP can come and see us. We can certainly continue that part of the work at that time. We have other reports and studies that have been going on for months, if not years, so I don't think it's a question of urgency in this matter.

I'll leave it there, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I have Ms. Khalid.

I also have information from the law clerk that I want to flag. It could take us down another path, which is to hear from him. It doesn't rule your amendment out of order—far from it—but I believe there's an issue with the amendment in that when the investigation is over, if charges are laid, then of course it goes before the courts. I'm not sure where that leaves us in terms of hearing from the RCMP. I'm just going to say that.

Ms. Khalid, you have the floor on the amendment to the motion.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Chair, I support this amendment and I don't have much more than that to say.

Let's go to a vote.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I'm afraid there is still a speaking list, so we will get there. I have two now.

Mr. Nater, you're up.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

I won't be too long on this, other than to say the amendment is just basically pushing off an appearance until who knows when.

I believe Mrs. Shanahan was being rather rude to my friend Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné in saying that she was being disingenuous earlier, but I think—

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

I have a point of order, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Go ahead.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Don't impugn motives.

We are friends.