Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Siksay's motion is I think a very good run-through of the facts surrounding the government's attempt, and indeed some success, at covering up its actions. So I basically agree with the facts in that motion. I think it clearly shows that there's been a fairly substantial attempt by the government to subvert the ability of committees and indeed Parliament to do their work.
I'd just like to make a couple of further points on the motion itself. The first point I think we have to bear in mind is that Mr. Togneri admitted, under oath before this committee, that he had in fact broken the law. In testimony before this committee, Mr. Togneri, on May 11, 2010, admitted to having sent the e-mail that caused the ATIP request to be withheld. According to the provisions of subsection 67.1(1) of the Access to Information Act:
No person shall, with intent to deny a right of access under this Act, (a) destroy, mutilate or alter a record; (b) falsify a record or make a false record; (c) conceal a record; or (d) direct, propose, counsel or cause any person in any manner to do anything mentioned in any of paragraphs (a) to (c).
At page 4 of his testimony on May 11, Mr. Togneri implicated Jillian Andrews as the political staff person he had delegated to amend, redact, edit the ATIP document, which had already been approved by the departmental ATIP office. Mr. Togneri also referenced the role of the Prime Minister's Office, as well as implicating his own minister, during testimony on May 6 and May 11, stating that the Minister of Public Works had given him informal authority to be involved in access to information issues; and, secondly, that the issues management team of the PMO had told ministerial exempt staff to be vigilant and to review access to information requests; and further, that if access to information requests could become an issue, they were discussed with the issues management team of the PMO.
I think Mr. Siksay mentioned earlier that the role of Dimitri Soudas, director of communications in the Prime Minister's Office, is certainly relevant to this motion and this issue, given Mr. Soudas' knowledge of the functioning of communications between PMO and ministers' offices.
I guess the real concern, Mr. Chair, is where do we go from here? Do we, at this stage, push this motion through to Parliament and have the Speaker rule on it, as happened on the Afghanistan affair? I think there's a good body of Canadians who really and sincerely believe that this government is probably the most secretive and most controlling in access to information that we've ever seen in Canadian history, which goes against the very commitment the Prime Minister made in the last election.
Do we go down that avenue as stated? Or do we find another approach and see if there is any goodwill on the part of the government to make the system work and allow committees to function as they're supposed to be able to function in this place, with a proper hearing process and proper evidence, so that we can, as committees, make the decisions based on the facts? I think we, here on our side, the Liberals, are willing to try one more time to see if there is goodwill on the part of the government. We've seen many times that goodwill isn't there.
The minutes of the procedure and House affairs committee just came out a few moments ago, Mr. Chair, and have already been reported in the press.
I'd like to read a motion that was agreed to at that committee:
That the Committee study the issue of the appearance of exempt staff and staff of parliamentary secretaries as witnesses before parliamentary committees and report its findings to the House no later than March 31, 2011.
I'm referring to the procedure and House affairs committee.
So that committee, with the deadline that's in place, rather than provoking further animosity at this time, gives the opportunity for all parties to come together and find a process that works under the rules.
We will be supporting the effort by the procedure and House affairs committee to try to find another avenue, rather than inflame this issue further at this time. But we certainly see the option in the future, if there isn't goodwill shown by the government on their part, to come back to a very serious and direct motion, as Mr. Siksay has put forward here, which is absolutely correct on the facts.
Thank you.