Madam Chair, it's not a violation of confidential information that we can say here, since we're not a party to the terms of the agreement setting out the confidential requirements. I don't know what those confidentiality requirements are, but generally speaking this committee is not subject to whatever the terms of those agreements might be.
The question is, if there is such a contract, would the minister be breaching that? While confidentiality generally means to me—Well, I guess, my short answer is no, in the sense that I think the minister has a legal obligation, in constitutional terms, to be here and account. But I think he has an obligation—and this committee, arguably, in the public interest, has an obligation—to take whatever steps can be taken to ensure the greatest amount of confidentiality, so that the information is not shared beyond what's immediately required for purposes of the business of this committee.
Let's not kid ourselves: there is a problem with in-camera meetings, historically. Ministers—and not just of this government, but also earlier governments—have shared the same reservations about in-camera meetings.
But that is the only opportunity, really, Madam Chair, to go the way of an in-camera meeting and just hope that in fact it will be successful in maintaining the confidentiality associated with the documents.