REGS Committee Meeting

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THE STANDING JOINT COMMITTEE FOR THE SCRUTINY OF REGULATIONS

EVIDENCE

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OTTAWA, Monday, March 18, 2024

The Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations met this day at 11 a.m. [ET] to conduct a review of Statutory Instruments; and, in camera, to discuss future business.

Mr. Dan Albas and Senator Yuen Pau Woo (Joint Chairs) in the chair.

[English]

The Joint Chair (Mr. Albas): Good morning. I would like to welcome everyone to this wonderful Ottawa Monday morning meeting of the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations.

Today, we are very honoured to have with us some witnesses. From the Canada Industrial Relations Board, we have Ginette Brazeau, Chairperson; and Sara Bennett, Acting Executive Director and Senior General Counsel.

Members of the committee, we will give our witnesses their opportunity to speak to the issues we have asked them to speak on, and then we will do our questions and answers after. I’m going to ask everyone to hold off on raising their hands until after the presentation. Then, we will proceed as we have done in other meetings.

Witnesses, welcome. Please go ahead.

SOR/2014-176 — STATUS OF THE ARTIST ACT PROCEDURAL REGULATIONS

SOR/2014-242 — REGULATIONS AMENDING THE STATUS OF THE ARTIST ACT PROCEDURAL REGULATIONS

(For text of documents, see Appendix A, p. 16A:1.)

Ginette Brazeau, Chairperson, Canada Industrial Relations Board: Joint chairs, members of Parliament and senators, thank you for the invitation to appear before you today. This provides me with an opportunity to update you on the progress being made toward amending the provisions of the Status of the Artist Act Procedural Regulations. I will refer to these as “the regulations” as we move forward. I am joined today by Sara Bennett, Acting Executive Director and Senior General Counsel, and I might rely upon her to provide more detailed information on the matters discussed today.

In previous correspondence sent to this committee, I had provided some background information regarding the activities under the Status of the Artist Act. I wanted to take a moment to review some of this information before discussing the regulations, which are the main topics of interest today.

[Translation]

The Status of the Artist Act was passed in 1992 and enacted in 1995, so just over 25 years ago.

Part II of this act establishes a framework for collective bargaining between artists who are independent workers and producers who want to retain their services for a specific project.

The federal Status of the Artist Act has limited application, in other words, it applies when the producer is a federal institution, so a federally regulated department or agency, such as the National Film Board.

[English]

As you are probably aware, the act at the time also established a specialized tribunal to deal with these matters — the Canadian Artist and Producers Professional Relations Tribunal. Legislative amendments were made in 2012 that abolished the tribunal and assigned responsibility for the act to our board, the Canada Industrial Relations Board. I was the executive director and general counsel with the board at that time and was directly involved in that transition. The board immediately initiated consultations with the artistic community in an effort to develop and adopt procedural regulations that governed the handling of the cases that were to be filed with the board under the act.

This resulted in the adoption of the Status of the Artist Act Procedural Regulations in 2014. These regulations were meant to provide transparency on how these matters are processed by the board.

The former tribunal was very active in the early years that followed the coming into force of the legislation as various artist associations sought to be recognized as the bargaining agent representing the sectors covered by the act. There is now limited activity under the act. The board has received 15 matters under the act since 2013 when the duties and responsibilities were transferred to us, which is approximately one case per year. This compares to our average workload of 985 cases per year that are filed with the board under other statutes, like the Canada Labour Code.

[Translation]

I recognize the importance of ensuring that the Status of the Artist Act Procedural Regulations meet the highest standards and good drafting practices. It is essential that we correct inconsistencies in terminology throughout the regulations and discrepancies between the English and French versions. The committee’s detailed comments were very helpful in this regard.

[English]

Moving forward with the work necessary to make these amendments required the delicate balancing of board priorities and limited resources during a challenging period as we faced an increasing caseload and the possibility that amendments to the act would be made. However, over the last 12 months, we have completed our full clause-by-clause review of the regulations and the comments that this committee provided over several years. As I indicated in my recent correspondence, I am pleased to report that our drafting instructions have now been sent to the Legislative Branch of the Department of Justice Canada, and the proposed changes address the vast majority of the committee’s comments. We will be working closely with Justice Canada to bring these changes to fruition.

I want to assure you that I am committed to completing this work as soon as possible and want to thank the committee for its work, its diligence and for holding me accountable to these commitments.

I welcome your questions. Thank you very much.

The Joint Chair (Mr. Albas): Thank you, Ms. Brazeau. We will now begin the question and answer period.

Mr. Davidson: Good morning. What we talked about here as a committee — and I think you’re being tied into this — is that we’re worried about accountability. To your comments, this all began in 2012, and now we’re in 2024. By the conduct of it being over 12 years, the board has shown that it is not accountable to Canadians.

I think what we’re worried about on this committee is that even when we asked the minister, the Liberal government and the Minister of Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages, they said that they are not responsible for the board. It is arm’s length. So I guess I’m wondering about the board. Who is responsible? Who is accountable? Who is your boss? If it is not the minister, who is accountable?

Ms. Brazeau: Thank you for the question. I’m accountable for this regulation. I report to Parliament through the Minister of Labour, like any other quasi-judicial tribunal under the federal family. So it is proper for this committee to ask these questions of me as the chairperson of the board and the accountable officer for these regulations.

Mr. Davidson: Is the minister responsible for your board? Is the minister who is accountable at the end of the day? I think that’s what we’re trying to figure out.

Ms. Brazeau: The minister would be accountable for the operations of the board. The minister cannot intervene in how we deal with cases or how we make our decisions, as you’re well aware. But at the end of the day, they would have a responsibility for ensuring the proper functioning of the board and the proper resourcing of the board for the work it has to do. And they are certainly accountable for the policies that we administer under the Canada Labour Code or the Status of the Artist Act. They have the policy responsibility, but I have responsibility for the day-to-day operations of the board.

Mr. Davidson: Right. Obviously, you believe now that French and English are very important, and that the regulations have to be understood in French and English. And I think my colleague here from the Bloc knows how important that is for sure, so that mistakes aren’t made and things aren’t interpreted incorrectly, because we have seen that before. So taking 12 years now for us to come to fruition — this committee worrying about things taking too long and people not being accountable for the length of time it takes and not getting back to the committee.

That’s why we’re here today. I can appreciate what you are saying now. We’re struggling here — 12 years. I am struggling, chair, with the fact that the minister is saying, “We’re arm’s length. We’re not responsible for this.” It just seems we’re worried about accountability now in Canada and who is actually accountable. I will get back to other comments and leave that there for now. I am encouraged about the fact that we are moving forward now for sure.

Ms. Brazeau: Can I just respond quickly to that? I have one point of clarification. The regulation was adopted in 2014 — 10 years ago from this time — and the committee’s comments to us started shortly thereafter. So in that regard, we certainly recognize the discrepancies in French and English, but we also wanted to acquire a little bit of experience with the regulation before engaging in a full review of the regulation, but I will admit that 10 years is a long time and we could have acted sooner. I take responsibility for that.

But going forward, I am committed — as I indicated to you today and indicated in my letter of March 6 — and we are now in the process with Justice Canada for the legislative drafting, and we are moving forward with a long series of amendments to rectify the discrepancies that we found.

[Translation]

I also take seriously the French language and the equivalence of its scope in interpreting the regulations. Thank you for your questions.

Mr. Trudel: Thank you for being here today. To follow up on my colleague’s questions, you mentioned in your opening remarks that you had a lot of work to do. In fact, you said that a lot of requests relating to several acts and several areas cross your desk. You mentioned about 900, I think. There are 40; clearly, it’s taken a long time over the last 10 years to deal with this.

How are requests prioritized when they arrive on your desk? Why is a particular bill or regulation prioritized in your analyses? How does it work? Who decides on priorities?

What we understand from the delay is that this file has been on your desk for 10 years. Requests have been made at committee, but I imagine there have been other draft regulations in the meantime that you’ve had to work on and that have probably passed before what we’re talking about today.

How did that happen? How do your priorities work?

Ms. Brazeau: We are a quasi-judicial tribunal. We respond to complaints and requests submitted to us. As a tribunal, we have to intervene in these cases. In some cases, we have deadlines for hearing and making decisions.

A bit like an administrative tribunal, our priority is to deal with requests and complaints that come in from all sides, in accordance with the Canada Labour Code, the Status of the Artist Act, and other acts that we apply — we apply two or three other acts.

No other requests have been received, apart from the committee’s request for amendments to regulations. This is the only regulation currently under review for which we have received comments that there are corrections to be made.

Priorities are assessed by evaluating the scope of these regulations, the impact they have on the files being handled on a day-to-day basis, and events that have occurred since then; for example, the Canada Labour Code has given us additional responsibilities, and there have been changes to the code with respect to the types of complaints and requests we must handle as an administrative tribunal. I’d also add that there were two and a half, three years of pandemic. During that time, we had to readjust how we operate and react to the way we hold hearings and handle complaints filed with us.

It’s an overall assessment of all of this that has meant that the regulations have, unfortunately, taken a lesser place in the steps we had to take in all these respects.

Mr. Trudel: The discrepancy between the English and French versions comes up again. I think it comes up at least six or seven times out of the 40 points that were brought to your attention. In an officially bilingual country, it’s important to have concordance between French and English documents. This seems fundamental to me. Shouldn’t this be a priority when a file arrives on your desk? What applies in Edmonton should apply in the same way to Trois-Rivières, Rivière-du-Loup or Montreal; it’s fundamental, isn’t it?

Ms. Brazeau: Yes, it’s very important that both versions are equivalent, since they both have the force of law. That’s why we’re moving ahead, and I fully intend to correct everything by the end of the year.

[English]

The Joint Chair (Mr. Albas): There seems to be quite a bit of interest.

Mr. Johns: Madam Chair, thank you for appearing today before the committee. I have a lot of concerns. Do you think 10 years is reasonable in terms of how long this is taking?

Ms. Brazeau: Thank you for the question.

I think that it has taken too long to approach and correct this regulation. In 2022, when I wrote to the committee, I committed to reviewing the regulation, and to addressing and making the housekeeping changes. In fact, over the past year we have engaged in a clause-by-clause review of the regulation, including a review of all the comments that were submitted to us by this committee.

We are now proceeding with regulations that I would consider go beyond just housekeeping. They address more substantive comments this committee made to us as well.

Mr. Johns: My concern is that I haven’t heard a good explanation for why it has taken a decade to get this work done. I understand about the pandemic — and we can certainly all respect that there were delays through the pandemic — but as parliamentarians, we had to continue doing work, departments had to continue doing business and translation continued. I can assure you that happened. I just came from the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates where we had over 200,000 pages of documents translated, and they seemed to be able to do that. I give translation services credit. They did it in a fairly reasonable amount of time despite some complaints that it wasn’t done on time. Members of our committee were complaining when it took a few extra weeks or months to get those documents translated. Here we are at a decade, and that’s one of the reasons.

Do you believe you have enough resources? Is that one of the barriers — that your board doesn’t have the resources to do translation and the work that you need to do? Maybe you can articulate the resources you have and if there is a shortfall. What is needed to be able to get this work done?

Ms. Brazeau: Thank you for the question.

To explain the delay, I want to come back to the substantive and major changes that impacted our operations in 2019. The changes were enacted to the Canada Labour Code in 2018, and those changes resulted in a doubling of our caseload in terms of complaints and applications coming to our board. Given the fact that we were facing a doubling of our caseload in 2019, we really had to think about how we were going to manage this new increased caseload and rethink how our resources would be deployed to address it. That took a lot of time and energy, and it pulled in all the resources the board had.

The board did obtain additional resources to face that additional workload, but it took some time to transition and address what we saw coming our way in terms of the workload. For those reasons, certain things had to be put aside for a period of time until we were certain that we would be able to respond to the enormous wave of change coming our way starting in 2019, which we’re just now seeing stabilize.

Therefore, when we looked at that in 2018 and 2019, we certainly had to make choices in terms of where we would focus our energy and resources. For that reason, there was a delay in addressing this specific regulation.

Mr. Johns: Are you relying on external consultants to provide the resources to be able to get this work done?

Ms. Brazeau: No, we’re not. We’re dealing with our internal resources, legal counsel.

Mr. Johns: My last question — because I know there are many people around the table — has to do with my concern around how we can have confidence that you will come back with the work that is necessary by December. From you appearing today, how can this committee have confidence that this is actually going to happen and that it will not be March or June 2025? What confidence can you bring to this committee today that this work will be completed by December of this year?

Ms. Brazeau: You have my commitment that this work will be completed as soon as possible. As I indicated in my opening remarks, we have now sent our detailed instructions to the Department of Justice, and we are engaged with them in the drafting of regulations based on those instructions that followed our detailed review of the regulations. Therefore, I am confident that it will proceed as expeditiously as possible. As this is a board regulation, I have also briefed board members on this regulation. They are prepared to address it once we are ready to adopt the regulation as a board.

Therefore, all the steps are being taken proactively to move forward as expeditiously as we can with this regulation.

The Joint Chair (Mr. Albas): Colleagues, for those who are on virtually, if you raise your hand using the raised-hand function and then pull it off, it can be confusing for your co-chair as to whether or not you still want to speak. Colleagues, please keep your hand up online so I will know who is next.

Mr. Webber: Thank you, Ms. Brazeau and Ms. Bennett, for being here today. Thank you to Mr. Johns for asking a lot of the questions that I wanted to ask. I appreciate your answers.

I just want to go further with what Mr. Johns was asking regarding your workload. You indicated in your comments that you have around 985 cases filed per year, and now you have the Canada Labour Code additional responsibilities as well as the further tasks caused by the pandemic.

You mentioned in your comments that you’re doing all this with limited resources. You have a large caseload but limited resources. These resources — is it a budget thing? Is it FTE, your staffing? Are you low on staffing and so you can’t get a lot of this done in a timely manner? You mentioned that the minister, of course, is responsible for the proper functioning of your board and for getting the proper resources to you. Do you need to ask the minister for some more money in order to get more staff to get the work done within a reasonable time frame? Is this something that is required?

Ms. Brazeau: Thank you for the question.

The board is aware that there are no unlimited resources. I have personally made representation to our minister that the changes to the code have had a significant impact on our work and resources, and that even though we received additional funding in 2019 for the additional workload, there are still pressures we need to address. So those representations have been made to the minister. I guess we’ll see on April 16 whether they will result in any increase to our budget and resources.

Having said that, there are also efforts that we need to put into the work. People need to spend time focusing on the regulations and think through the changes. That requires effort from our legal services and members of the board in order to come forward with a proposal that will address and correct the deficiencies in the regulations. It is a combination of resources and having the time to focus on the issue while we maintain a rate of disposition for the case load that comes to us.

People come to us to resolve their complaints, to resolve their workplace issues, and we intervene with mediation, adjudication and decision making if we need to make a decision to resolve their dispute. That requires effort and time on the part of all our board members and staff. It’s a combination of all of that which has led us to where we are today, but now that we are stabilizing in terms of the case load, as I said, I’m confident that we can put in the necessary work to make this regulation right.

Mr. Webber: Excellent. Thank you, Ms. Brazeau.

Mr. Louis: Thank you to the witnesses, Ms. Brazeau and Ms. Bennett, for being here. You mentioned that the vast majority of concerns — that was the quote — raised by the committee are being addressed. Can you give us a percentage, an approximation, of what you consider are the vast majority of concerns?

Ms. Brazeau: There are 40 changes or suggestions that were made, and I believe that for 8 or 9, we did not fully adopt the committee’s recommendation. Some partly, but with some of them we diverged a little bit from the suggestion from the committee. That would be about 90%. My math is not very good.

Mr. Louis: That’s why I asked for an approximation. You say you are engaged with the Department of Justice about working on these regulations. Do you consider December a reasonable timeline moving forward? Because we’ve heard that it has taken quite long to fix some of the language mistakes, which you referred to as housekeeping, and that should have been the quicker one.

Can you say that December is a reasonable timeline, as much as you can work? What kind of accountability — we’ve heard that before — can be put in place? What do you suggest we do as an oversight committee if we’re not hearing back by December?

Ms. Brazeau: Good question. Thank you. As you’re well aware, the regulation requires the input of several partners. We work with Justice Canada. Our board members have to review and adopt the regulation. We then have to go to the Privy Council Office for registration, publication and the steps that are required to bring the regulation into force.

I’m engaged with all the partners at this time, and hopefully we can achieve the timeline set out. I’m confident we can achieve that timeline set out for December, if not sooner.

What do I recommend in terms of accountability? If the committee would like me to report in writing at some juncture — maybe in the summer, maybe June — as to where we are with the drafting, it may be an undertaking that I’m prepared to take to inform the committee of the progress.

Mr. Louis: Thank you. That was my next question. What you mentioned were quantifiable steps. It would be nice to know. Instead of us setting a deadline further away and finding out what happened, perhaps we can decide on some sort of system where you are reporting in an informal way or otherwise, then we can know.

On the amendments and the parts that are not yet done and have not been sent to Justice, are there complications there that are causing those not to be sent? I’m concerned that even after, let’s say, 90% are done, there’s still that extra 10%. What is the challenge with the regulations that remain that you have been working on?

Ms. Brazeau: I’ll just speak generally to some of them. We considered the regulation as drafted. We considered the comments that were made by the committee. We have another regulation, the Canada Industrial Relations Board Regulations, 2012, and it’s very similar to the regulation under the Status of the Artist Act. We’ve considered our experience and our case law under the regulations, and our assessment, after considering all of those different aspects, was that one or some of the suggested changes were not desirable for the operation of our regulation or our statute. I’ll leave it at that as a general comment.

Mr. Louis: My last question will piggyback off the last. Technology itself has changed, and artists have changed with that. Do you find what was written in 2012 is applicable, or is there an evolution that you have to adapt to?

Ms. Brazeau: As I said, we engaged in a clause-by-clause review of the regulation. For example, there is something that wasn’t commented on by the committee, but we are of the view that we need to get rid of faxes in our regulation, because we’ve moved on with a new case management system and we interact with the parties electronically. That’s a change that was desirable and was not necessarily front and centre in the review, but it is a consequence of our evolution technologically.

Mr. Louis: Thank you for your time.

Mr. Erskine-Smith: First, in terms of undertakings, if you report back to the committee by June that would be helpful.

The second undertaking, just for clarity — I’m new to this committee and I have to admit, it was a bit confusing to follow what is outstanding. The initial response, I think, even back in 2014 or 2015, articulated that we’re going to get some of these things done, but not all, and without clarity as to why you weren’t doing all of them. Here we are 10 years later, and there is still not entire clarity until your bit of an answer to Mr. Louis’s question as to why you’re not doing all of them.

Just like any list of undertakings, if you can send us a chart — the lawyer on this committee can assist us with this — and list off the ones that you’re not doing and then list off why. It may be entirely reasonable; it may not be. I have no idea. But until I get that chart, I have no way to determine that whatsoever. Can you provide that to us as well? Is that acceptable?

For whatever reason, virtually, I didn’t get an answer there.

Ms. Brazeau: Sorry. My apologies. I was consulting with our senior legal counsel.

We can certainly provide a response to the committee’s last correspondence where there was still a gap on our response to the committee’s recommendations.

Mr. Erskine-Smith: It shouldn’t be complicated. You’re addressing the vast majority of concerns raised by the committee. That’s a big check. Then with whatever is outstanding, just do a simple undertakings chart to say what is outstanding that you are not addressing and here is why you are not addressing it. It should be relatively straightforward.

I don’t think this is really a resource question; it’s not a 2019 question, because, really, this could have taken place anytime between 2015 and 2019 as well. The amendments, I understand, were agreed to in 2015. My only concern, I have to be honest, is that this is obviously an unacceptable delay. I think you’ve acknowledged as much. This isn’t a resource question, this isn’t a 2019 changes question and this isn’t a pandemic question. This should have been done well before that.

My one concern in more recent communication is that there is a lack of correspondence with this committee when this committee was writing. In the end, the letter we got on March 6 notes that the amendments have been sent to Justice. But they were sent on March 5, the day before the letter was sent, which suggests to me that the only reason the thing got done at all is because of prompting and prodding by this committee.

Do you have anything to say to that?

Ms. Brazeau: I can only say that the committee is certainly keeping the board accountable for these regulations, and I thank the committee for doing that. I can only reiterate my commitment now to get these adopted as expeditiously as possible and no later than the end of this year. Thank you.

Mr. Erskine-Smith: Thank you. I hope that takes place, because we really shouldn’t be having this meeting at all, and I hope to not have another one.

Ms. Brazeau: Thank you.

Senator Dean: Thank you for your candour and transparency, and for providing full answers to all of the questions put to you today. That is not always the case. For that, I commend you, and I expect my colleagues around the table recognize that too.

You are an operational agency with considerable powers providing outward facing services in a context in which, in some cases if not in many cases, the health of the economy is threatened. You’ve got big responsibilities. This is one of them, but I can say as one committee member here that I can understand why something of this magnitude would probably be pushed to the side for any number of reasons, including the fact that the statute, in its operation that we’re talking about, appears to have a small number of litigants, if I have heard you correctly, perhaps in the single figures.

Likely, no harm was done here. That is, no harm done save that we have a constitutional responsibility to operate in a bilingual way, which is very important. All of that has to be considered in the context of this, including your willingness to come and talk to us and to be very honest with us today.

These things are going to happen. This is relatively minor in the scheme of things, but I think what you’ve learned, as I’ve learned on this committee, is that even relatively small translation issues require attention. I’ve been reminded again that this committee is indeed the Catcher in the Rye in terms of looking out over the sweep of federal undertakings. There is some competition for the Holden Caulfield in the room, as you will have noticed. I think it’s important to wrap this up on a positive note and I’m attempting to do that, so thanks a lot.

Ms. Brazeau: Thank you for your comments.

The Joint Chair (Mr. Albas): Members of the committee, is there anyone else who would like to ask a question or state a viewpoint in the matter before us?

Mr. Davidson: I think what our colleague Nate Erskine-Smith asked for was reasonable. We need that play-by-play and to ensure that those amendments are immediately translated into French and English. I don’t want that to be one of the misses that we’re not dealing with. That is, the translation must be done for sure and we must get a play-by-play on what is being done and what isn’t. If we need to ask more questions, then I think we have assurances now that you will respond to the board. We would hate to have to come back. It would be unbelievable. Thank you.

The Joint Chair (Mr. Albas): Our committee was created by Parliament for a purpose, as was your board. It’s the authority that has been delegated to you by Parliament. I do hope we don’t have to repeat this and that we will be getting a complete response to your concerns with the initial concerns raised by legal counsel.

Thank you again for your attendance. I wish you Godspeed on the regulatory side. It is a long process.

Ms. Brazeau: Thank you for your time.

The Joint Chair (Mr. Albas): Thank you, witnesses.

The Joint Chair (Senator Woo): We are not going in camera quite yet; we have two items to deal with, speedily, hopefully.

SOR/2022-112 — REGULATIONS AMENDING THE CANADA EDUCATION SAVINGS REGULATIONS (MISCELLANEOUS PROGRAM)

SOR/2023-60 — REGULATIONS AMENDING AND REPEALING CERTAIN DEPARTMENT OF THE ENVIRONMENT REGULATIONS (MISCELLANEOUS PROGRAM)

SOR/94-753 — INDIAN OIL AND GAS REGULATIONS, 1995

(For text of documents, see Appendix B, p. 16B:1.)

The Joint Chair (Senator Woo): We discussed at our last meeting that when it comes to “Action Taken,” we would not require any presentations from our legal counsel unless there was a desire from the members.

I will let you look through those three items. If I see no interest in having a presentation, we will take it as approved.

SI/2019-113 — ORDER ASSIGNING THE HONOURABLE MARY F.Y. NG, MINISTER OF STATE (SMALL BUSINESS), TO ASSIST THE MINISTER OF INDUSTRY

SI/2019-114 — ORDER DESIGNATING THE MINISTER OF PUBLIC WORKS AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES TO BE THE MINISTER REFERRED TO IN THAT ACT

SI/2019-118— ORDER DESIGNATING THE PRESIDENT OF THE QUEEN’S PRIVY COUNCIL FOR CANADA AS THE MINISTER FOR THE PURPOSES OF THAT ACT

SI/2019-119 — ORDER DESIGNATING THE PRESIDENT OF THE QUEEN’S PRIVY COUNCIL FOR CANADA AS THE RESPONSIBLE MINISTER FOR THE PURPOSES OF THE ELECTORAL BOUNDARIES READJUSTMENT SUSPENSION ACT, 1994

SI/2019-120 — ORDER DESIGNATING THE PRESIDENT OF THE QUEEN’S PRIVY COUNCIL FOR CANADA AS THE RESPONSIBLE MINISTER FOR THE PURPOSES OF THE REFERENDUM ACT

SI/2019-121 — ORDER DESIGNATING THE MINISTER OF INDUSTRY AS (1) THE MINISTER FOR THE PURPOSES OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES RESEARCH COUNCIL ACT; AND (2) THE APPROPRIATE MINISTER WITH RESPECT TO THE SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES RESEARCH COUNCIL FOR THE PURPOSES OF THE FINANCIAL ADMINISTRATION ACT

SI/2019-124 — ORDER DESIGNATING THE DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER AND MINISTER OF INTERGOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS AS THE MINISTER FOR THE PURPOSES OF THAT ACT

SI/2019-133 — ORDER DESIGNATING THE MINISTER OF FAMILIES, CHILDREN AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT TO BE THE MINISTER FOR THE PURPOSES OF THAT ACT

SI/2019-126 — ORDER DESIGNATING THE MINISTER OF EMPLOYMENT AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT, A MINISTER OF THE CROWN, TO BE “THE MINISTER” FOR THE PURPOSES OF THAT ACT

SI/2020-40 — ORDER FIXING JUNE 4, 2020 AS THE DAY ON WHICH CERTAIN PROVISIONS OF THAT ACT COME INTO FORCE

The Joint Chair (Senator Woo): The next item is “Statutory Instruments Without Comment.” It is the same issue here. There is a rather long list of items that our legal counsel have deemed to be acceptable. If I see no interest in having further discussion, we’ll take them as accepted.

At this stage, we will go in camera, but before that, I need to ask if it is agreed that the recording of this in camera meeting be permitted and that one copy of the audio recording be kept with general counsel for consultation purposes.

Hon. Members: Agreed.

The Joint Chair (Senator Woo): Thank you.

This is a reminder that the deliberations in any proceedings related to in camera meetings are confidential. Any unauthorized disclosure of in-camera deliberations, proceedings and documents may be treated as a contempt or breach of parliamentary privilege.

With that said, we will proceed in camera.

(The committee continued in camera.)