Thank you. I do appreciate the opportunity to provide comment on this. We've heard, from the government side, rationale referencing my colleague, and I would suggest that the references that were provided, just for the purpose of people watching, were in the context of whether or not we go in camera. I believe we held that up yesterday when we supported going in camera, so I don't believe that would be my rationale for supporting this motion.
I recall how, when I was visiting this committee with my colleague Mr. Angus, he argued for the need to have discretion and privacy around the sensitive nature of the information that would come to this committee. I'll suggest to you, Madam Chair and members of this committee, that I would have hoped we could land in a better situation from the get-go in terms of having more support from the governing side with regard to the Prime Minister being before us. We didn't get that. However, what we did get clear about was that we wanted that kind of privacy. I think what this motion does, in fairness to my colleague from the Bloc, is beg the question of what constitutes an in camera meeting. When is an in camera meeting not an in camera meeting?
Having said that, and just drawing on my own experience, I would never want to be accused, in a situation as sensitive as this, of leaking information, nor do I think it would ever be the intention of my colleague to leak information from an in camera meeting. I think that would be a grave violation of the trust that we have among our members. I'm also not so naive as to not know that this does happen from time to time, and particularly around these sensitive issues. For that reason, I'll be supporting the motion to have these “extra suspenders” on the in camera meeting, for lack of a better term, the extra protections, so that we can never be accused of leaking this sensitive information.
What we ultimately want to get to, I believe, is the truth. I believe we will get there. I believe we will be able to communicate to our constituents and Canadians what that truth is, notwithstanding the salacious details that may come forward in this in camera meeting. I'll also go on the record to note—because I don't know if I'll be here next week—that the extent to which the government is going to provide these extra cautions around the information also, to me, suggests just how sensitive the information may turn out to be, so that will certainly unfold.
I want to give this full rationale so my friends to the much-farther right of me, physically in this room as well as ideologically, understand why I've come to this decision to support the government in this motion and also to let the government know that I believe my colleague's original intention was to provide a protection to Margaret Trudeau and the private family members of the Trudeau family.
My hope, to go on the record for the last time, is that in future consideration—because I would agree that this is only the beginning of an ongoing process—parties will treat people's family members with the same kind of consideration and privacy that is being afforded to the Prime Minister's family, because, quite frankly, what I don't want the public to think is that the Prime Minister's family is getting a special kind of privacy consideration. That is not the case. That is not what is happening here. Should any member of any person's family be brought forward, we would also fight to have these types of protections in place so that these types of details aren't exposed for the media and whatever ensuing circus comes our way.
Thank you.