May 26,
2015
The
Management Commission met at approximately 6:00 p.m. in the House of Assembly
Chamber.
MR. SPEAKER (Verge):
Welcome, members of the
Commission. We have a couple of
members just walking in there. We
will be set to go in a minute.
Before
we start the actual business of this meeting, I will ask people to introduce
themselves. I will start with
myself. I am Wade Verge, the Member
for Lewisporte district and Chair of the Commission.
MR. LITTLEJOHN:
Glen Littlejohn, MHA, Port
de Grave.
MR. HUTCHINGS:
Keith Hutchings, MHA,
Ferryland.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Andrew Parsons, MHA, Burgeo
La Poile.
MR. POLLARD:
Kevin Pollard, MHA, Baie
Verte Springdale.
MS MICHAEL:
Lorraine Michael, MHA,
Signal Hill Quidi Vidi.
MR. KING:
Darin King, MHA, Grand Bank.
MS KEEFE:
Marie Keefe, Clerk's Office.
CLERK:
Sandra Barnes, Clerk.
MR. SPEAKER:
There has been an update to
some material that was sent out to you.
I think Marie is making sure all of you have that now.
We did notice a couple of small numerical errors.
They do not make a whole lot of difference to what is there, but the
total budget was increased by $500, I believe.
We just wanted to make sure that you do have that.
The
first order of business is the minutes for the last Commission meeting that we
had on May 13, 2015. The minutes
for the in camera and the public session have been distributed.
I would
entertain a motion to accept them.
Moved
by Mr. Pollard; seconded by Ms Michael that the minutes be approved.
All
those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
MR. SPEAKER:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
On
motion, minutes adopted as circulated.
MR. SPEAKER:
The main item of business
that brings us here today really deals with business that is flowing out of the
changes that are coming to the Electoral Boundaries Act.
The
legislation that we passed in January reduces the number of seats from
forty-eight to forty. In our own
legislation that governs members in the way in which they are paid to do their
services through various allowances, that piece of legislation identifies
forty-eight districts. These
districts are named in that piece of legislation.
One of the things that we have to do is we have to change that
legislation in order for the new forty districts to actually be able to receive
allowances.
That is
the sum substance of it. If you
look in your materials, I will just take you through what is listed there.
Number one, this is BN 2015-018, I am looking at, 1. The concept of a
capital region is used throughout the Rules to determine Members' eligibility
for certain expenses. That
definition [paragraph 2(d)] must be amended to reflect the names of the proposed
districts encompassed in the capital region.
Then we
have number, 2. Members from districts within close proximity to the capital
region have the option of claiming mileage to return to their permanent
residence, as opposed to saying in the capital region, when the House is in
session. Those districts are
specifically named in the current legislation.
We would need to change those names to reflect the new forty districts.
Schedule A of the Rules outlines the allocations for Intra-Constituency Costs
for each district. Should the new
electoral boundaries come into effect, Schedule A will need to be amended to
reflect the names of the 40 districts and give authority to pay expenditures
under this allocation.
The
amendments are really consequential amendments to the Electoral Boundaries Act.
I do not know if that is the right title
CLERK:
(Inaudible) should the
electoral boundary changes come forward, it would be amendments to the House of
Assembly Act.
MR. SPEAKER:
It is the House of Assembly
Act.
Thank
you.
Also,
if you look at your information that we have circulated, in recognition of the
fact that instead of forty-eight districts there will now be forty districts, a
significant number of those districts have become larger.
So, we have done a comparison of the size of districts prior to this
proposed change and what it would be after.
The information we got on the new roads was from Economics and Statistics
and the Department of Finance.
We are
not suggesting that this is a final measure, but what we need to do here is we
want to make sure that after the next election, members have the ability to
receive an allowance to do their work.
There are adjustments that we have made and we are suggesting here and
if you look at the rationale, we have established several benchmarks.
For example, if a district increased in its total road allocation by less
than 100 kilometres, then we did not put in any extra resource.
If it is between 100 and 200 then we allocated, I think, an extra $700;
between 200 and 300, it is an extra $1,000; between 300 and 400, there is an
extra $1,400.
That is
it in a nutshell and any member who feels like they do not have enough of a
resource or they want to appeal that after the fact, they still have that
opportunity. However, what this
does is that it enables people, after the next election, to avail of an
allowance that is not unlike what they currently have; but the next MCRC would
really do a thorough analysis of this and adjustments will be made, I guess,
depending on the recommendations of the next MCRC which brings me to another
thing I want you to consider, is that given the changing in the districts and
the need that this should be looked at in a timely manner, the Commission might
want to consider passing a motion that says that after the next election, it
would be expected that the MCRC would meet within six months.
That
was done for the forty-seventh General Assembly but it only applied to that
Assembly. The previous Commission
actually made a motion that said the MCRC would meet within six months following
this past election, and I would think that given these changes it certainly
would be my position that we should meet in a timely manner.
That is
my say on that, and I will open up the floor now for any questions you may have.
Ms
Michael.
MS MICHAEL:
I think it does say it
somewhere in the document I did read the words in principle, and I guess I
want to make the point that obviously we can only approve this in principle; we
do not know what is going to be the report of the electoral boundaries
commission. We may know the forty
seats because we legislated that already, but everything else is going to be
new. So we have to be open to that,
and I think it is important for us to say that clearly.
I guess we also then need to look at what the process would be when the
report comes out, how much time we will have for you to make the changes, et
cetera, if changes were required.
I think
I am correct in saying that we can only approve this in principle today.
MR. SPEAKER:
Absolutely, and I actually
meant to include that with my opening dialogue there.
We have
made these decisions based on the proposal that has come out right now, and of
course we know that the Commission or the committee has gone back and sought
consultations around the Province.
Then they will submit their final report June 9 or if they need the extra days,
I think they have until June 19. We
are not expecting, or I should say I am not expecting that there will be huge
changes to what they have done.
There
may be some name changes, there may be some boundaries that get moved, but we
are still going to end up with forty districts, that was their mandate.
Given the timeliness of this that we have to have this amendment ready,
put through the proper channels and ready to go to the House the same time that
the electoral boundaries comes in with their report and the House of Assembly
Act is actually amended, I am asking you to look at what is here and you decide
if there are changes, are you comfortable with giving the Speaker the authority
to juggle things around like, for example, if there are name changes, then
obviously what we have here, if the new district, for example, Baie Verte
Green Bay comes in as Baie Verte Triton, for example, then I am not sure that
we would need to schedule a Management Commission meeting to come back to have
that kind of thing cleared. If
there is slight boundary changes and if somebody's total road allocation changes
slightly, if we make the adjustment that we have made in accordance with the
principles that we have here, do we need to come back and meet again?
Consider that in your discussion and as you are thinking through this now.
Mr.
Parsons.
MR. A. PARSONS:
Further to that, I am trying
to make sure I understand the timelines.
June 9 is the date we are hearing, so what we are saying is we have to
have this ready to go at the same time.
So we are still going to be here in the House at that time is my
understanding, obviously, debating that.
I would
have no problem with the Management Commission coming back again to sit down and
discuss that, even if the changes are minute I think I would feel more
comfortable this is certainly nothing to do with the Speaker, but just as an
all-party committee to come back if there are changes they are going to have
to be put together for us to have a look at, I do not think that will take a lot
of time. It may be nothing, it may
be minute, but there may possibly be something that we unprepared for.
I would feel more comfortable just still having that meeting, given the
fact that we are not all going to be hauled in out of our districts and we will
be here in the area, I think.
MR. SPEAKER:
Fair.
Ms
Michael.
MS MICHAEL:
I think I take the same
positon because this is such an important piece that we are doing.
While I have every bit of trust in the Speaker and in the Clerk and the
offices, we all know that we have had times when something has been passed in
the House and we find there is an error.
With all eyes of the committee, we are all responsible for it and so I
think in that way it would be better if we did come back in person, have it
ahead of time and really make sure yes, I do not need to say more.
MR. SPEAKER:
So regardless of what
changes here, what I am hearing is that we should come back.
So once the electoral boundaries report comes in and we are getting ready
to bring this to the House, we would probably need to call a Management
Commission meeting on short notice.
Any
further comment on that?
MS MICHAEL:
Just one more question.
MR. SPEAKER:
Yes.
MS MICHAEL:
Right now this is something
that is in legislation, so we are proposing changes that will have to come into
the House to be voted on as part of the new changes that are going to happen
from the report. In actual fact,
this has to go to whoever is in charge of the writing of legislation.
It is not just in the hands of your office, but it also I guess that is
in Department of Justice is it, that is ultimately in charge of legislation?
MR. SPEAKER:
Yes, go ahead Sandra.
CLERK:
You are right.
It has to go to Legislative Counsel because it becomes a consequential
amendment to any changes that may be made to the House of Assembly Act.
MS MICHAEL:
Right.
CLERK:
The important piece for us
right now is to make sure that the Management Commission is onside with the
approach we have taken, because we do not have time on June 9 to rethink the
approach. So if everybody is okay
with this approach, then when we get new boundaries, Economics and Statistics
can turn around some data fairly quickly for us.
We can do a quick analysis on any changes, as long as everybody is onside
with this approach.
MS MICHAEL:
Well I agree with the logic
of how you have done the allotment.
You used the same principle that had been used by the I guess it was the
committee that made changes the last time, the members' commission, was it?
CLERK:
Yes, there have been a few
changes. The original template was
set up by Green and it is actually in the appendix of the report.
Then MCRC 2012 made some minor changes.
MS MICHAEL:
That is right.
CLERK:
They took the helicopters
out and gave some extra kilometres.
Then in the Budget process, remember we had some districts that were really
pressured in terms of the I&E, and we just did a little bit of redistribution.
So that is the series of changes.
Actually if you go back and look at the schedules, you will see that.
Of course, our act is a bit unique in that the rules have to go through
the House as well as the act itself.
MS MICHAEL:
Right, thank you.
MR. SPEAKER:
Where we are not privy to
the full rationale or all the thinking that went in when Justice Green did an
allocation for forty-eight districts, what we did to try and keep as much as
possible in line with the legislation that is there, if there is a district with
an allocation now that is similar to the new district, then we just gave that
new district the allocation that was given before.
For
example, there are going to be two new districts if the boundaries stay the way
they are now. Grand Falls-Windsor
and Corner Brook basically become two very confined districts.
So we said, well the proper appropriation to give those two districts
should be probably the same as what is given to districts in the capital region.
If
there is $7,000, for example, given to a member who lives in St. John's and his
or her district is in that confined area, then that should be the same that we
would give to Grand Falls-Windsor or Corner Brook.
Then the rest of it, we just looked at it.
If there was an increase, then we made the adjustment fairly to all the
affected districts and equitably.
Having said that, there is still, I believe, a need for the MCRC to take a
tighter and closer look at this as soon as possible.
Any
further comment?
I am
going to read a motion here now. If
you are comfortable with it then I would invite a mover and a seconder.
Pursuant to Section 64 of the House of Assembly Accountability, Integrity and
Administration Act, the Commission hereby gives approval in principle to the
attached proposed amendments to the Members' Resources and Allowances Rules,
subject to determination of the allocations upon issuance of the final electoral
boundaries report and final wording by the Office of the Legislative Counsel and
approval of the House of Assembly.
Mr.
Parsons.
MR. A. PARSONS:
I would like to move that, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER:
Moved by Mr. Parsons,
seconded by Ms Michael.
Am I
getting a sense that we are in agreement that the MCRC should meet within six
months after the next election?
I will
read the following motion: The
Commission herby gives approval to the attached proposed amendments to the House
of Assembly Accountability, Integrity and Administration Act subject to the
final wording by the Office of the Legislative Counsel and approval of the House
of Assembly.
Subsection 16(1.1) of the House of Assembly Accountability, Integrity and
Administration Act is repealed and the following is substituted: The Members'
Compensation Review Committee first appointed under subsection (1) during the
forty-eighth General Assembly shall be appointed not more than six months after
the election of members to that General Assembly.
Moved
by Mr. Hutchings; seconded by Mr. Parsons.
That
concludes the business.
I will
entertain a motion for adjournment.
Moved
by Ms Michael; seconded by Mr. Hutchings.
All those in favour, 'aye.'
SOME HON. MEMBERS:
Aye.
MR. SPEAKER:
All those against, 'nay.'
Carried.
I will
be in touch once we get the final report.
On
motion, meeting adjourned.