Evidence of meeting #38 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was may.
A recording is available from Parliament.
NDP
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you for being here today, Mr. Bard.
I want to come back to some of the items because this is extremely important.
To copy and paste a document and send it, you often start with "forward". There is the "forward as" heading and I can forward as email, as PIN, and depending on the document, as SMS.
NDP
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
According to you testimony, there is no way of knowing whether things have been copied and pasted and sent PIN to PIN. You have no trace of that.
Chief Information Officer, House of Commons
No, we didn't put that process in place because we wanted to respect...
NDP
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
...confidentiality.
But still, in terms of our work, it becomes relevant to know whether what was extracted for the 18th or the 19th, for example, covers everything. According to your testimony, it is possible that this is not the case because you don't have that record.
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
Second, I would like you to repeat—forgive me, it must be me who didn't understand—what you keep for 30 days and what you keep for one year.
Chief Information Officer, House of Commons
Each day, we take a picture of what is in all the emails. The English word is "snapshot"; I don't know the right French word. As well, we keep a log every day of what goes out externally and what is received from outside, to know that those emails were received and that they were sent to the outside.
Chief Information Officer, House of Commons
Yes, in some cases there is the content, and in others there is only the title.
NDP
Chief Information Officer, House of Commons
It may be that the document wasn't attached.
NDP
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
Right. So we agree on that point.
I'm going to come back to Ms. DeBellefeuille's question.
Let's talk about BlackBerrys. In my case, my BlackBerry and my computer have the same account.
NDP
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
That's right.
There are "assistant 1", "assistant 2" and "assistant 3". If the member is "5" here, they are "5" on their computer in their office. The hard disk in their office keeps everything.
Chief Information Officer, House of Commons
No. Everything relating to email is kept in a central storage environment.
NDP
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
So there would be no trace left of an email that I sent a year and a half ago.
Chief Information Officer, House of Commons
It's in the backups I make. However, if you keep your email for an unlimited time, it is always part of your environment.
NDP
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
Yes, we agree on that. That's good. That gives us some hope.
That is the most important aspect, to me. The Speaker has recognized that we are going to ask... Ms. O'Brien and Mr. Walsh remind us that we have privileges here. This is all a question of protecting privileges. We do not want to breach one privilege to protect another. Our actions have to be consistent.
However, you have just given us an excellent explanation. We will eventually have questions for Mr. Ullyatt's account holder. Ordinarily, we will be able to learn everything that happened, at least during those days. Perhaps our meeting with Ms. Block will raise other questions. At that point, we will be able to see whether we might be interested in other days or whether there was other correspondence with those people.
I would like to summarize by addressing one final point. We are approaching the 30 days after those fateful dates. Nothing of what exists today will be in danger of being lost, when we get to December 18 and 19?
Chief Information Officer, House of Commons
With all the questions I am being asked, I will make sure that it is kept longer.
NDP
Thomas Mulcair NDP Outremont, QC
That was what I was hoping to hear, Mr. Bard.
Thank you again for being here.
