We'll resume our meeting.
Colleagues, on Friday Mr. Walsh, who is with us right now, the law clerk of the House--and he's joined by Mr. Greg Tardi, who's senior parliamentary counsel for the House as well--received a letter from the Oliphant commission, counsel to counsel, as it were, or lawyer to lawyer. He raised it with me on Friday; he sent me a copy of it to look at and asked for my input.
I shouldn't talk to this yet, because there is a procedural matter we have to deal with, but I thought it was important to bring it to the committee. I asked Mr. Walsh to write up some matters, and I personally only considered the very last item, which is the motion itself, to be relevant here. I was concerned that the commission is going to proceed with its work unless we respond. I'm sure Mr. Walsh is going to respond, and I think he's basically asking whether or not this committee should reaffirm the undertaking it made to our witnesses with regard to parliamentary privilege.
So I'm asking to bring it to the committee for consideration. My concern is simply with regard to times, since those hearings are going to start. If we don't respond to them, they're going to go and try what they can, but I do understand efforts will be made to use the testimony before the public inquiry, as a consequence. I think it's important that we decide whether or not we want to reaffirm our view and get that communicated to the commission as early as possible so there's no misunderstanding as to the rules of Parliament.
First of all, I have to ask whether or not the committee will waive the 48-hour notice required to bring an item before the committee.