Information & Ethics Committee on June 19th, 2006

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Minister.

I'm sitting here thinking of Yogi Berra saying this is déjà vu all over again, because I've certainly seen this movie. I've been in this exact seat in this room with a different Minister of Justice saying exactly the same thing: we need to begin the process, to start to review, to study, and analyze the nuances of possible amendments, blah, blah, blah. It's sick. I can't tell you how profoundly disappointed and frustrated and even angry I am that we're at this stage of this issue at this point of this Parliament. It's not satisfactory; it's annoying. We all know what needs to be done, and it's not the job of the committee.

When you've been around politics long enough, you don't even write a campaign leaflet by committee, never mind a piece of legislation. It's not the committee's job to come up with legislation. It's not the commissioner's job to come up with legislation. It's the job of the government of the day, especially when you should feel duty bound by your own campaign literature from the last federal election. It's a matter of historical record, and I haven't heard any Conservative deny the intent. The language is as clear as the nose on your face. The number one priority on your list of accountability issues was to implement all the recommendations of the Information Commissioner on access to information. It was a promise.

At the first opportunity in the FAA, first it was in and then, miraculously, it disappeared. There was a change of heart.

So I don't accept that this committee should be seized of the issue of studying access to information reform. I think we should be working on a draft bill. The same questions, the very legitimate questions you raised, all of them are interesting and they're legitimate and they're unanswered. But we could be studying them in the context of a bill instead of a draft or another discussion paper.

I now know when the Liberals bailed on access to information. I know the precise moment of the specific cabinet meeting where the Prime Minister intervened and said, “No more, we're not going there.” When did you guys change your mind about access to information? When exactly did you get the rug pulled out from under you in terms of fulfilling your campaign promise?

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

All I can point out to you is that a number of issues are open questions about whether it would be feasible to implement exactly specifically what was stated by the Information Commissioner, especially when the Information Commissioner says he hasn't had the opportunity to examine all these issues. So if you're saying we should have brought in a bill essentially fundamentally changing solicitor-client privilege, I would suggest that you, as opposition members, would have grave concerns with that particular issue.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

As the ruling party, sir, you could have brought in a bill without that, saying we're not going to include that because we have some concerns about it.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

And then you would have said to me, you're not implementing all the recommendations.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

But at least we would have had a bill. "Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown." It's your job to bring in the bill. We can either take it or leave it as a committee. Maybe we would have added that back in, but at least we'd be working on something material, not studying how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. I'm sick of this academic exercise because it's dominated my life for about two and a half years now.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Well, unfortunately, it's not an academic exercise.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

It has been to date.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

The point is the implications of the decisions this committee makes with respect to these issues have profound impacts on the advice cabinet ministers receive, on national security issues--

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Not if it never finds its way into a bill.

[The Chair, Liberal, Tom Wappel]

Mr. Martin, would you let the minister finish his remarks?

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

It has profound implications on national security, profound implications on commercial third-party interests--those are all issues you can consider as a committee and give the government some recommendations on.

I know, Mr. Martin, you'll be having some free time over the summer, and since you won't be sitting in the House, if you want to suggest that the committee sit during the summer time.... I know it would interfere a little bit with some of the hard constituency work you have to do, but if that's what you would like to do, that would move the bill ahead a lot more quickly.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

We'll certainly consider that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Tom Wappel]

You have time, Mr. Martin. Anything else?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

I'm happy to do all that we can and to provide all the input we can, but I still want to know when exactly this dramatic turnabout took place. Who got to you? Was it senior bureaucrats? Was it the push-back from senior bureaucrats that did it? Was it your senators in the Senate?

I mean, there are enemies to open government. There are people who are opposed to the idea of freedom of information. There are very few ruling parties or governments that are fans of open government once they take power.

As I say, I know what happened to the Liberals. I know the precise day, hour, moment, that access to information was jettisoned by the Liberal Party--even after their promises.

[The Chair, Liberal, Tom Wappel]

I'd be fascinated to hear that. What was the date?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

I'll share it with you sometime.

I want to know what happened to the Tory's resolve. What happened to the grand, flowery rhetoric that used to come from the Conservatives about freedom of information as a fundamental constitutional right? All of a sudden, it's no longer of interest, and it's death by committee in studying this issue yet again.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Mr. Martin, putting this kind of detailed discussion paper in front of eminent parliamentarians such as yourself is hardly death by committee. I would say this is elevating the discussion one step higher.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Well, that's--

[The Chair, Liberal, Tom Wappel]

I guess we'll agree to disagree on that, won't we, Mr. Martin?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Well, do I have any time?

[The Chair, Liberal, Tom Wappel]

You have about 10 seconds, or you can go to the next round.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Let me simply say that the one issue you do raise that I'd like to deal with is this idea of personifying government to the status of client. In my view, the sacred relationship between solicitor-client is an individual and his lawyer. There's room for abuse when you start to view government as client and every lawyer in the country who is advising them as their solicitor; everything would be confidential because of solicitor-client privilege. I would be interested in your view of the personification of government. It worries me.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

I can tell you, it didn't originate with government. Solicitor-client privilege attaches to corporations, for example, in order for them to conduct their business. It's simply been a necessary doctrine that allows decisions to be made on an informed basis. Government, perhaps even more so than private interests, needs to make its decisions on an informed basis that not only deal with narrow partisan interests but with the public interest as well.

[The Chair, Liberal, Tom Wappel]

Thank you.

Mr. Tilson.

[David Tilson, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Minister.

I'd like to return to the issue that everybody seems to be talking about, which is this section 23, the privilege section. Section 23 of the existing act seems to be repeated in paragraph 23(a) of the new bill—when I say the new bill, I mean the bill proposed by the Information Commission—and then this injury test is added to paragraph (b).

Quite frankly, I have trouble with both. I have trouble with the existing act and I have trouble with the new act. Quite frankly, I think a government can be a client; a government is a client. A minister seeks a legal opinion on anything.