The House of Commons has adjourned for summer break — two days earlier than scheduled — as negotiations over a public inquiry into foreign interference appear to be reaching a conclusion.
Government House Leader Mark Holland introduced the motion to adjourn the House until Sept. 18 during a floor debate Wednesday evening, with the motion receiving unanimous consent.
Holland said under the motion, the House will be considered to have sat on Thursday and Friday, which were the final scheduled days of the spring session. All parties agreed to the motion before it was introduced, he said.
As the House rises, MPs and Parliament staffers are beginning their summer recess with a number of high-profile issues still looming over the government — the most pressing of which is whether to call a foreign interference inquiry.
Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc is leading what the government called ongoing and productive discussions with the Conservatives, NDP and Bloc Quebecois about how to move forward on a potential inquiry.
Earlier Wednesday, Holland told reporters that he expected news on the question of an inquiry “very, very soon, given the productive nature of those conversations.”
The public inquiry was on the negotiating table as the government sought to get priority bills passed. It also wanted to avoid the possibility of hundreds of votes on Conservative amendments to the government’s main and supplementary estimates, which lay out specific amounts that can be spent on hundreds of government programs.
The government’s usual end-of-session motion agreeing to fast-track some final pieces of legislation through various stages of debate passed Wednesday with unanimous consent.
While calls for a public inquiry remain unanswered, discussions have been underway as to how one might look.
Opposition leaders met last week to try to come to a consensus on what they wanted the government to do.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said this week his party would only put forward names on who they would want to lead a potential inquiry after the government officially calls one.
He also said the government has asked for a meeting with all parties on Thursday.
Bloc Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet said Wednesday morning he hoped an agreement on the inquiry could even be hours away.
Blanchet suggested the inquiry would focus on allegations that the Chinese government had interfered in Canadian democracy, but that it would not be restricted to that subject.
He said he believed that at a minimum, the Bloc and the Liberals would agree on details of the inquiry and that it might also be supported by the NDP and Conservatives.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said Wednesday he was “not confident about the timing” of an agreement on an inquiry, but said he had seen more openness from the government to calling one.
Inquiry talks aside, Holland told reporters the spring session was “extremely productive and historic,” with 15 bills moved through the House in 15 weeks.
Those included the latest federal budget, the enshrinement of affordable child care agreements with the provinces and territories, the so-called “grocery rebate” and increases to federal health-care funding.
Other bills Holland highlighted included updates to the Environmental Protection Act and the Official Languages Act.
The government also passed legislation that made hybrid sittings a permanent fixture of Parliament.
“It marks a period of time that, despite the noise that’s often in Parliament, Canadians can look at what their Parliament and government achieved and see enormous progress,” Holland said.
—With files from the Canadian Press
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