Mr. Speaker, the minister's proposition today seems to be that properly informing Parliament and honestly and fully answering questions about crucial issues like our mission in Afghanistan are somehow inconsistent with protecting the public interest or safeguarding national security or ensuring the most safe and secure conditions for our troops and others in the field in Afghanistan and maintaining good international relations. He says there is a fundamental inconsistency between properly informing Parliament and safeguarding those other things.
I would ask the minister, why is the government the only party that is in a position to safeguard those other things? Why is it not possible for the House of Commons and Parliament, which the Speaker made a ruling on earlier today, having all the powers to do so, to protect any sensitive information just as well as, and perhaps better than, the government can do?