HANSARD
Printed and Published by Nova Scotia Hansard Reporting Services
Ms. Maureen MacDonald (Chair)
Mr. Chuck Porter (Vice-Chairman)
Mr. Keith Colwell
In Attendance:
Ms. Mora Stevens
Legislative Committee Clerk
Mr. Gordon Hebb, QC
Chief Legislative Counsel
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HALIFAX, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 24, 2007
SUBCOMMITTEE ON PUBLIC ACCOUNTS
8:30 A.M.
CHAIR
Ms. Maureen MacDonald
MADAM CHAIR: I'll call the subcommittee to order. I want to thank my colleagues for being here this morning. Actually, I was remiss last week, I should have known enough to put a few more items on the agenda for the clerk. It doesn't give her enough things to schedule, so this is really why we are meeting this morning. If we could approve a number of things, that would be really good, because then it will give her some good material to work with. I'm going to start by asking Mr. Porter, do you have any additional suggestions from your caucus?
MR. CHUCK PORTER: None. I did ask, and I do thank you for that opportunity. Only whatever was on the list that we had originally submitted, Madam Chair, would be what was there. I didn't even have that with me this morning, I apologize for that. I know that it has been submitted, so perhaps the clerk may have that.
MS. MORA STEVENS (Legislative Committee Clerk): It has been approved.
MR. PORTER: It has been approved, so if there's anything on there, you can choose from that.
MADAM CHAIR: Basically, we're dealing with the two lists that are in front of us. At the last meeting, I had indicated that the three items on the NDP caucus list actually are in the priority that we had assigned, but I think, Mr. Colwell, you had indicated that your list isn't necessarily in priority. Do you have any suggestions from that list, which you would like to see proceed first? What we'll do is, I think we'll just go one, two, one, two, one, two - we'll pick one from each list.
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MR. KEITH COLWELL: I think I'd like to go with the Office of Immigration as number one. Do you want me to give the list?
MADAM CHAIR: Yes, because the NDP caucus list is already prioritized. If we approve the topics, what will happen is the clerk will take the first Liberal topic, the first NDP topic, then go to the second Liberal, the second NDP and so on, until she has enough scheduled that she feels comfortable, that she feels she has things under control for us.
MR. COLWELL: No. 1 is the Office of Immigration; No. 2 would be the Department of Health, physician payments; No. 3 would be the Department of Transportation and Public Works; No. 4, the Department of Education, higher learning; No. 5, Department of Community Services, early childhood learning; No. 6, Department of Health, wait times; and No. 7, Nova Scotia Power Inc. Actually, I would like to trade No. 6 and No. 2, two Department of Health ones, if I could make the wait times No. 2 and the physician payments No. 6. Sorry about that.
MADAM CHAIR: Is it agreed, as is our normal practice, we systematically go with a topic from each caucus? I would say that if the PC caucus does have topics, then alert us to the fact and we can have a subcommittee meeting, and we will do what we can to work them into the schedule.
MR. PORTER: There was a list provided previously to the clerk. There were names on that. I don't know that we've exhausted that list, I guess that's my thought.
MS. STEVENS: I think we might have. You're talking about the September/October list. All the other lists, I know, have been completed. I will check back again, just to see.
MR. PORTER: Yes, if you would. I don't recall who was on the list, first and foremost, and maybe the next statement is I don't recall our list being exhausted. But that's fine. If there's someone left - if there isn't, I'll continue to seek out to see if there are any others.
MS. STEVENS: If there are any left on that list, I'll e-mail that to you as soon as today's meeting is over, and e-mail it out to the subcommittee.
MR. PORTER: That's very good, thanks.
MADAM CHAIR: Is it agreed now that we will bring these topics forward to the committee today for their approval?
It is agreed. Thank you.
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The other item on the schedule for this morning is this question around requests for documentation. I meant to raise this at our last Public Accounts Committee meeting at the end, but we had run over time, really, and I didn't want to get into it then. I thought this would be the best place to do it. This committee works best when we have material prior to witnesses coming so that we can prepare ourselves for the questioning. In the past, it has been the practice of the Public Accounts Committee - this is some time ago, before I was the Chair - when witnesses were being scheduled, the clerk would write the witnesses and indicate if there were any specific documents, reports or what have you that the committee members would be looking for as part of their preparatory work.
We've more or less moved away from that practice. The clerk does a search, puts together a package, goes on the Web site and what have you. But I think it would help the work of this committee if we went back to the practice of identifying if there are any specific reports, analyses or what have you that could be provided prior to witnesses coming in, and I'll use the example of housing. We've had people from the housing section of Community Services, on several occasions, in front of us. Often when they come, they bring with them materials that show what their wait lists are, the length of their wait lists, the distribution of housing around the province, the units that have been approved, or whatever.
Now, there's absolutely no reason why reports like that, and information like that, can't be provided prior to their coming, and then the members would be able to not use their time asking, necessarily, questions about what are, but the why, why is this the case? So I would like us to go back to a system of identifying any information that we can ask witnesses to bring prior to coming here. So this is my idea, or my suggestion, and I'm putting that in front of you for your consideration.
Mr. Colwell.
MR. COLWELL: Yes, Madam Chair, I believe this is an excellent idea and I would fully support it.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Porter.
MR. PORTER: Thank you, Madam Chair. I, too, would support that. It seems like sometimes there is a substantial amount of information that comes from the clerk in those binders that is often not relevant to the questioning we're asking in many situations, so I think that would be a great idea, actually. I would look forward to that, to have something more relevant to the actual meeting itself, so thank you.
MADAM CHAIR: Okay, so what I would suggest we report back to the Public Accounts Committee today is that we will try out this process of asking for reports, documents and what have you, ahead of time, from witnesses. What I would suggest is
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that the various members of the committee, if you have something specific that you're interested in, you send that directly to the clerk, you say to the clerk, could you include in the request the following information, and the clerk will include those things in the letter she sends and in the communication she has with the potential witnesses.
When the material is received, it will be distributed to everyone on the committee. If we don't get material we ask for, then we'll deal with that at committee. I think that will be what I will say today, as a report back to the members. Is that agreed?
MR. PORTER: I guess my only other comment would be, when we make the request, I suppose given the time frame, it would certainly have to be within reason. You wouldn't expect to get a substantial amount, perhaps, but maybe at least an overview of what it is that we're shooting for.
MADAM CHAIR: Absolutely. I think that would be very helpful. So okay, is there anything further? Any other business?
Hearing none, we stand adjourned until 9:00 a.m., when the committee meets. Thank you.
[The committee adjourned at 8:41 a.m.]
