Information & Ethics Committee on Feb. 27th, 2024

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Certainly you can appreciate that on the outside, having had two elections within the period when this was highly contentious, the timing for the general public, I think, leads to—whether necessarily so or unnecessarily so—theories of cover-up or theories of delay, theories of political interference and timing. Again, to the same effects as when you don't have access to information, it's my assertion that when the public doesn't have access to good information, they are led down these paths.

Was it also you who would have ultimately made the decision whether to prosecute or not?

[Commr Michael Duheme]

Ultimately, I rely on the subject matter experts from the unit.

I just wanted to go back to one comment, Mr. Chair. At no time did we brief the minister or the PM or any politically appointed individual on this file. To even suggest that this was delayed.... They didn't even know what stage we were at with the investigation delay because of elections. It was on us. I admit there was a mistake on us. It could have moved forward, and we corrected that.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

To get back to my question, would you ultimately have been the person to decide whether to prosecute or not to prosecute?

[Commr Michael Duheme]

Ultimately, we would sit down and have a discussion with the Crown prosecutor assigned to the file. Within the team here, I would be sitting down with our folks and be guided by our subject matter experts.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Okay.

Just to be clear, you're the commissioner now.

[Commr Michael Duheme]

I am the commissioner now.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Okay.

I'm just asking you to take some leadership now. Ultimately, on your end, would the decision have been yours or would you have reported to somebody else to make the decision?

[Commr Michael Duheme]

I wouldn't delegate it down, but every charge doesn't come up to me for approval.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Certainly one involving the Prime Minister would likely have your approval.

[Commr Michael Duheme]

I would be informed and I would be supportive, but it's not every charge that makes its way up to the commissioner.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

But certainly.... Look, let's just be frank. You have a duty of candour. I'm going to extend that duty to this committee. I need you to be candid and take responsibility about whether you were the one to make the decision or whether you would have reported up to somebody to make the decision. Ultimately, there would have been somebody to sign off at some point in time. There's a chain of command in our paramilitary policing units. There's a chain of command that you would have been a part of.

Did you make the decision, yes or no?

[Commr Michael Duheme]

I would have been guided by my subject matter experts and supporting them. Obviously, if we were charging the Prime Minister, for sure, I would have been on board.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you.

I did give you a little bit of Mr. Housefather's time because he was short.

That completes our first six-minute round.

I just want to advise members of the committee that about an hour before the meeting commenced, we received correspondence from Democracy Watch. It did come in both official languages, but it wasn't distributed to the committee because, as per the routine motions that were adopted in December, I asked the clerk to conduct a linguistic review. It's being done now. Once it's confirmed by translation, the French version of it, I will distribute it to the committee as well. There were a series of questions that Mr. Conacher had submitted.

That being said, we're going to go to our second round, of five minutes.

We're going to start with Mr. Barrett.

Go ahead.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

I have questions for you that come from an access to information request. It's ATIP A-2021-02029. It deals with a decision tree from paragraph 121(1)(c) of the Criminal Code, under “Frauds on the government”.

I provided it to you, Commissioner, and to the staff sergeant, just before the meeting started.

As we move through the document, this decision tree asks a series of questions. The first question is, was Mr. Trudeau a government official at the time that he took a vacation to Bells Cay—

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I have a point of order, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Go ahead on the point of order, Ms. Khalid.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I realize that the witnesses and Mr. Barrett have the documents, but we would also like to follow along, if that's okay.

Can Mr. Barrett share them?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Go ahead on the point, Mr. Barrett.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

I'd be happy to provide them to the clerk. They'll go into translation and then they'll be furnished to other members of the committee.

It wasn't proactively disclosed by the government; it was made available by ATIP. I don't have any questions for other members of the committee, so they don't need a copy of it. If they would like to email me and ask for an English-only copy, I can furnish them with that, but I don't have it in French. I will provide it to the clerk and translation services can deal with it.

I'd like to continue with my questions, Chair. It's not required for me to provide other members of the committee with documents that are provided to witnesses. It's not in our standing orders.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

I'm going to ask that Mr. Barrett furnish that to the clerk so that we can have it translated and supplied.

If he's only referencing it for the purposes of asking questions, I don't see.... It's not a document that's submitted to the committee for that purpose. He's referring to—

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

If that's the case—if the witnesses have it and Mr. Barrett has it—then we as members of the committee should be able to look at it, too, while these questions are going on.

I'm not sure if my colleagues agree, but I'm a little bit lost without having this document in front of me so I can follow along, too.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

I'm not asking them any questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

I'm going to allow this to occur. Mr. Barrett will be referring to the documents, I assume, based on his first question.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

I'd like to finish my first question.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Right. You're going to complete your first question.

The point I'm making, Ms. Khalid, is that he can reference this, just as any other member has paper in front of them that's not shared with other members of the committee. This is an access to information document that he has in his possession. He'll be reading from that document, I assume, and that will be translated at a time. I don't really see the need for other members of the committee to have that.