It feels like we're back in Nineteen Eighty-Four. Let's start with the circular logic. The Speaker of the House received a point of privilege about the cover-up of these documents. He said he couldn't deal with this and that it should be sent to the committee. Here we are at committee, and now Liberal members are arguing that the committee can't deal with this and to leave that with the Speaker.
In Orwell's great work, these loudspeakers used to yell out to get people into the rhythm of circular thought and confuse them. The poem they would repeat over again was:
Under the spreading chestnut tree
I sold you and you sold me:
There lie they, and here lie we
Under the spreading chestnut tree.
Here we are, under the spreading chestnut tree, listening to the circular logic of Liberal members who try to bounce this issue back and forth, keep it out of everyone's hands so that it's nowhere and nothing. We want the truth, and we're going to pursue the truth.
Speaking of the truth, the second argument of our Liberal colleagues here is that the truth no longer exists because of prorogation. Not only did prorogation shut down the debate, but it erased history. Now they are telling us there never were any documents, they didn't exist, the committee never received a thing, and what are you talking about? That page of history has been erased by the ministry of truth. The officials there went through and erased that out of existence. There have been no documents. There is no WE. The Kielburgers, we don't have any record of their existence. “Everything faded into mist. The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became truth.”
That's what we have before us right now.
Mr. Chair, if you are still with me here in the real world, I think you will agree that we did receive documents, they were covered in ink, they did not respect the will of this committee, and a breach of our privilege has occurred. It is now only up to us to report it to the House, where it can be voted upon by members and ruled upon by the Speaker. Let us go forth and do our job. Let us put an end to the circular logic, the erasure of history and the silly games played by the members of the governing party.