Senate committees up and running after long wait

The Senate has authorized its committees to begin meeting regularly and studying any issues related to their general mandate for the three months remaining before Parliament breaks for the summer. Senators agreed during a March 30 sitting to adopt a report from the Senate Selection Committee that laid out a schedule of regular, all-virtual meetings for their committees. They also agreed to a motion from the Senate’s group leaders to allow committees to study and report on any issue relevant to their general mandate, up until the Senate rises for the summer on June 23. Before the agreement was reached March 30, half of the Senate’s committees had not met regularly since the last election. The COVID-19 pandemic, Senate negotiations over funding and committee seats, and the sluggish pace at which the Liberal government brought forward its legislative agenda before the pandemic began all contributed to those delays. Senate committees will now meet in an entirely virtual format, scrapping the hybrid format that has allowed Senators to attend the limited meetings that have been taking place in person if they wished to. Fourteen of the Senate’s 18 regular committees will now have regular time slots in which to meet once every week, for up to two hours at a time. The remaining four committees—the Rules Committee, Selection Committee, Audit and Oversight Committee, and Ethics Committee—and two joint parliamentary committees will have a chance to meet every other week. That amounts to a total of 17 meeting time slots per week. However, only 14 committees will be able to meet on a given week, because of a shortage of interpreters and technical staff. Committees working on government business will be given priority. In more normal times, Senate committees are given a total of 26 time slots in which to meet per week. Even virtual committee meetings must be supported by Senate staff, including interpreters, IT support staff, procedural clerks, and personal staff for the Senators involved. Senate staff also support weekly meetings of the four groups. The Selection Committee report said that Senate staff could support 14 “events” in total each week, including sittings of the Upper Chamber, and group meetings. It also said that capacity could be increased “slightly” if meetings were scheduled carefully, according to the report. The Senate will continue to hold its full sittings in a hybrid fashion. It typically meets three times on a sitting week. The four Senate groups also each hold one virtual meeting per week, which must be supported by some staff. Roughly 300 Senate staff are required to come to work in person to support all-virtual Senate sittings and meetings. Senate committees will only be meeting on weeks that the Senate sits, under the terms of the Selection Committee report that was agreed to in the Senate on March 30. Several Senate committees held a virtual meeting on April 1, since the Senate sat earlier in the week. Conservative Senate Leader Don Plett (Landmark, Man.) told The Hill Times last month that he opposed holding virtual committee meetings when the Senate is not sitting to deal with government business, a scenario that would expose Senate staff, but not Senators, to a higher risk of contracting the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. Leaders of the three other Senate groups—the ISG, CSG, and PSG—each told The Hill Times last month that their members were eager to get on with committee work. The Senate also approved its new workplace harassment policy on March 30. It was passed on division, meaning some Senators objected, but a formal vote was not held. The harassment policy has been in the works since 2017, following allegations and investigations of harassment and sexual misconduct by former Senator Don Meredith. The new policy has attracted some controversy, including criticism from Ind. Sen. Marilou McPhedran (Manitoba) over rules binding harassment victims to silence while their complaints are being dealt with through the policy. peter@hilltimes.com @PJMazereeuw

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Senate committees up and running after long wait

Senators agreed on March 30 to let committees begin meeting regularly, some for the first time since the 2019 election.

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