Mr. Chair, I'll respectfully disagree, but the respect I have for you is such that I won't carry on that disagreement. I believe I've always been relevant, but if colleagues will deviate from that and put forward a different idea, including you, that's fine.
You mentioned something there that is important. You talked about the text of the subamendment. I am very passionate about the issues I'm bringing up here—the ideas of fairness, the ideas of justice—and I won't apologize for that passion, but just so we're on the same page, it would make sense for me to read into the record the subamendment in question so that we're all on the same page. I'll do that now.
The subamendment states as follows:
That the committee requests the complete package of documents provided to the Office of the Law Clerk and Parliamentary Counsel of the House of Commons by relevant Deputy Ministers or the signatories of the transmittal letters, as well as the final package of documents that the Law Clerk and Parliamentary Counsel of the House of Commons approved for release, that both of the document packages be provided to the Committee no later than October 19, 2020, and that after the committee reviews the two different versions of documents, the committee invite each of the relevant Deputy Ministers or the signatories of the transmittal letters, as well as the Law Clerk and Parliamentary Counsel of the House of Commons, to give testimony regarding the redactions applied to the documents that were requested and granted in the motion adopted on July 7, 2020—
This is the part of the motion that I was touching on before I was interrupted by my honourable colleague. It continues:
—and that until such a time as this testimony is complete, debate on the main motion and amendment from Pierre Poilievre be suspended and that the Chair be authorized to schedule these witnesses, and convene a meeting to resume debate on Pierre Poilievre's motion once these meetings have taken place.
I think we're all caught up now, if we weren't already. That is the text of the subamendment.
To my honourable colleagues in the opposition, here you have Liberal members willing to put...I won't even say “water in our wine”, because we've never really been against transparency and accountability here. We are absolutely for it, but we raise our points on the basis of a fundamental belief that public servants shouldn't just be talked about. When we're discussing their decisions, we should be able to ask them about their decisions and, on the basis of fairness, on the basis of justice, we should allow those public servants to speak, to share their perspective.
I know that one particular colleague who stands out, Mr. Poilievre, continues to point to redacted documents and continues to draw a line between documents that have been redacted and—only in his mind is it making sense—some sort of a plot on the part of the government to withhold information. Nothing could be further from the truth.
I was very happy to hear my colleague Mr. Fraser talk earlier about how to put things into context and about the importance of recognizing cabinet confidence, which is a long-established principle.
Documents that have been redacted are not documents that the government and public servants were trying to hide from the committee. Redactions happen for reasons relating to cabinet confidence, something that my colleague from Carleton, Mr. Poilievre, recognized. He suddenly forgot it. When he went into opposition, I guess he forgot it, but in 2014, Mr. Chair, he was asked about a briefing book, including the table of contents, if I remember correctly. He was asked a question by an NDP member of Parliament in 2014 about these redactions in documents that were in Mr. Poilievre's purview and possession.
In the response given to the NDP on the issue of redactions, this time not just as a Conservative member of Parliament but also as the minister for democratic reform, which placed Mr. Poilievre in a very good position because, as someone responsible for democratic institutions, he would know all about cabinet confidences and what that means, especially in the Westminster parliamentary tradition, he said as follows:
Mr. Speaker, the decision on what to reveal is made by non-partisan public servants, for whom it has long been a tradition not to reveal cabinet confidences. That has been the case going back to all previous governments of all party stripes.
Mr. Chair, that is a very key point of relevance that we have to acknowledge as a committee. In fact, I want to repeat it, Mr. Chair, because we need to be crystal clear on these points.
Mr. Poilievre replied in 2014:
Mr. Speaker, the decision on what to reveal is made by non-partisan public servants, for whom it has long been a tradition not to reveal cabinet confidences. That has been the case going back to all previous governments of all party stripes.
He recognizes the importance of cabinet confidence. We heard earlier about cabinet confidence in relation to redacted documents. There's nothing nefarious, nothing out of sort, nothing unethical here, Mr. Chair. Cabinet confidence is very important. That's the long and the short of it. It really is absolutely vital that we understand these things in context.
If members of the opposition want to play games and try to trick Canadians by somehow connecting the dots in a certain way and rearranging the pieces of the puzzle so that it creates a particular narrative to suit their interests, I suppose they can do that, but what this committee should be doing is embracing the idea of fairness, number one.
This subamendment that's been proposed allows for the transparency and accountability the government is talking about, but does so in a way that does not exclude the opportunity for public servants to come and speak. We can ask them questions relating to cabinet confidence. It will be interesting to hear the questions that Mr. Poilievre has when he raises it, as I expect he would, seeing that he, at least one time, understood how the principle operated. He could put questions about cabinet confidence to them, and we would see what the matter is and what the opposition is so troubled by.
In fact, what I think we'll ultimately come to conclude, Mr. Chair, is that we're fighting here about the need for cabinet confidence to be held back, and also private information in the form of phone numbers and the names of kids of public servants. I wonder, if the Conservatives were in power and if such issues came up, what side of the debate they would be on. In fact, we just heard what side of the debate they were on in 2014, Mr. Chair.
Let's get back to the issues that are truly important. We need to see legislation passed in Parliament, because these are spending matters, and as a matter of course, they need to be put in place through legislation. I'm talking, of course, about the updates to the Canada emergency wage subsidy. I'm talking, of course, about updates to the Canada emergency business account. I'm speaking of the rent support that Canadians—