Orders of the Day - Surprise! They're still here!

Despite the best efforts of its inhabitants to cobble together an all-party agreement to shut down the House for the holidays last night, the Chamber is still open for business for a few more hours, thus ensuring that the two committee meetings teasered in yesterday's OotD will go ahead after all, although there's still a wee bit of confusion over exactly what time the Foreign Affairs committee will begin its much-anticipated interrogation of Rights and Democracy chairman Aurel Braun and president Gerard Latulippe.

At the moment, they're still slated to meet later this afternoon -- behind closed doors, alas, at least to begin with --  but there's a chance that it may be bumped up, courtesy of a motion passed by the committee earlier this week, which states that "in the event of an adjournment of the House prior to the meeting scheduled at 3:30 p.m. on Thursday, December 16, 2010, officials from Rights & Democracy be asked to appear from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. instead, subject to their availability."

Since the House will, in fact, have adjourned prior to the currently appointed hour -- immediately after Question Period, in fact, according to the motion passed last night -- I've sent out frantic queries to the usual inside suspects to find out which of the two timelines the committee will be following today. As soon as I hear back, I'll let you know.

UPDATE: Okay, apparently they're still on for 3:30 pm. I'll keep you posted.

Speaking of witness availability, the embattled agency took the somewhat unorthodox step of issuing a advisory specifically to state that the duo "will not be avalaible [sic] to the media before the Committee Meeting" -- which is, it reminds readers, "in camera." In other words, nothing to see -- or hear -- here, folks -- move along, move along. Does that mean they're planning to stop by for a little post-meeting transparency and accountability session with reporters on their way out? I guess we'll just have to stake out the hallway to find out.

Meanwhile, over at Procedure and House Affairs, Conservative MP Kelly Block will make an almost certainly nearly as keenly watched appearance of her own, although it's not clear how much more she'll have to say about her now former staffer's now notorious leak of that now never to be finalized draft report on the finance committee's pre-budget consultations. She did, after all, give a reasonably complete, if brief account during her original mea culpa in the House, which was supplemented by the committee's report on the possible breach of privilege that set the stage for the inquiry now underway.

Still, that was before the committee heard from the aforementioned former staffer and the five lobbyists to whom he sent the document in question; her Commons colleagues may well have come with a few follow up questions, although the chair will almost certainly make short work of any attempt to veer outside the relatively limited terms of reference for this particular inquiry. Yes, that would include any queries about Bestmail.ca, said former staffer's ostensibly afterhours political direct mail company, which would fall under the jurisdiction of the Board of Internal Economy, not that this would necessarily stop an inquisitive opposition MP from attempting to ask Block about it.

Other than that, it's pretty much a let's-just-sit-here-quietly-and-run-down-the-clock day on the Hill, which is understandable, since no one really expected that the House would still be sitting today. Like life, parliament is, it seems, what happens while you're making other plans.