Hon. Scott Tannas: Honourable senators, I want to put a few words on the record. I do support the motion in amendment. I supported the motion without the amendment, but I want to thank Senator Saint-Germain for the improvement.

I support the motion, and it was highlighted to me last week why we need it. COVID visited my house. My son had it, and so I decided, as a precaution, to stay at home and participate via the hybrid format. I was able to participate rather than having to stay home, out of an abundance of caution.

I think it is clear to everybody that the hybrid regime has been invaluable in allowing the Senate to function during the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, it was vital in many, many instances as infections rose and fell and so on. I think we have to acknowledge that our role, the Senate’s valuable role in Canada’s democracy was significantly diminished by the way in which we were forced to operate. It was enhanced over what it could have been, but the Senate was not delivering full value to Canada over the course of the last two years. Our committee work was severely hampered over the last many months by, simply put, resource bottlenecks that limited time and continue to limit time for committee meetings.

While I am happy to support this motion with an extension to the end of June, I believe we have to get back without any straitjackets on our committees to fully doing our work. I think hybrid sittings and the technology and the system that we have need to be an important component of our disaster recovery plans in the future, but this system is not any kind of a viable option to be made permanent, unless we want to permanently dilute the value of the Senate.

Senator Marwah, in this chamber and with a statement that was published, detailed the challenges that we have in fully and completely running committees and the chamber as we have done for 150 years prior to COVID-19. He made it clear that it is not possible for us to conduct Senate business the way in which we did it pre-pandemic and have hybrid sittings. I think we all know that.

So, I can’t support further extending this, and I can’t support what I know to be the wishes of some senators — in fact, some members of Parliament — that hybrid sittings be made permanent under the current system. If there is any risk that we want to consider making this permanent, somebody has to do some work around what it would take. Is it absolutely possible for us to run the way that we ran before the pandemic and have hybrid services delivered, and not the other way around? Not that we would torque ourselves into whatever schedule to accommodate the technology. The technology would need to accommodate our schedule, which includes people coming to Ottawa, flying from across the country. I travel on average 18 hours a week to get here.

If there is any appetite in the chamber to consider making this permanent, there is work to be done on the feasibility of it and what it would cost in order for us to fully deliver on our services.

I won’t be supporting it, but I worry that there are some scenarios, potentially, where we could come under a lot of pressure to do something. We should have the answers. I want to put that on the record, colleagues. I know many of you agree with me, but I know that there are others who are desirous of making this permanent. If we are even going to discuss it or consider it, I think there is significant work to be done. I would hope that the administration, potentially the Internal Economy Committee, would give this their consideration. With that, I’ll thank you.