Mr. Chair, I fail to really appreciate the concerns of my Liberal colleagues. Quite frankly, I do recall that conversation we had about potential redactions and all the grounds by which those redactions could be maintained and established.
At no point in time.... Quite frankly, we didn't think it would be necessary to specify in the form of that particular motion and the order that was drafted to compel those officials to do the obvious and give us some justification for that redaction. That happens all the time. Why it's not done here is very disturbing.
When we had the committee studying the WE scandal and all the redactions that flowed and the documentation that was produced, there was always an explanation on every page as to what the redaction pertained to.
I listened very carefully to Senator Carignan's commentary and I agree with him wholeheartedly. We also have to accept that there will be redactions when it comes to personal background information such as phone numbers, addresses and things of that nature.
To put an emphasis on my concerns about my Liberal colleagues taking the position that they are taking, if this were an ATIP scenario, every redaction would have a legal ground cited. Parliament has far more powers than the ATIP process, yet the government is treating this committee on an inferior basis to a regular citizen under the ATIP process, which I find very disturbing.