Evidence of meeting #51 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 decision.
A recording is available from Parliament.
2:50 p.m.
Liberal
Marcel Proulx Liberal Hull—Aylmer, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Chair, now that you've recognized me, I'd like to move a motion. I move:
That the Committee now resume in public the consideration of instructions for the drafting of a report in relation to the question of privilege relating to the failure of the government to fully provide the documents as ordered by the House until 4:30 p.m.
2:50 p.m.
Conservative
2:50 p.m.
Conservative
Tom Lukiwski Conservative Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK
No discussion; if you want to put it to a vote, we agree.
2:50 p.m.
Liberal
Marcel Proulx Liberal Hull—Aylmer, QC
Pardon me, Mr. Chair.
The idea is to replace the time that we had scheduled this afternoon to discuss the Oda point of privilege, because that one we have until March 25, whereas the other one....
As a comment to the arguments we had yesterday about the motion that was tabled by my colleague, I would like to remind the committee that it was shown on the schedule yesterday as “Committee Business: Instructions for the drafting of a report”.
That's what we were doing. We were giving instructions.
2:55 p.m.
Conservative
2:55 p.m.
Conservative
Harold Albrecht Conservative Kitchener—Conestoga, ON
Mr. Chair, could I please have the motion restated? I'm not sure if he said it's starting at 4:30 or ending at 4:30.
2:55 p.m.
An hon. member
It will be public, correct?
2:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Yes, we will be public.
Can the chair, with the indulgence of the committee, have the discretion that if I need a break for a couple of minutes during that period of time, it will be okay?
2:55 p.m.
Some hon. members
Agreed.
2:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Great.
Thank you, Mr. Walsh. Great to see you again. Thank you for coming. Write if you find work--all of the above.
2:55 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON
Why don't we all take a little break right now? Would that be acceptable if we just suspended for a few minutes?
I don't know about anybody else, but I wouldn't mind answering the call of nature.
2:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Well, if we have approval of the motion.... Is anybody opposed to the motion?
2:55 p.m.
An hon. member
No.
2:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
[See Minutes of Proceedings]
Would it be okay if we suspended until three o'clock? That would give us five minutes.
Let's do that. We're in public after that.
3 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
All right. We're ready.
Mr. Albrecht, you're leading us off in the discussion on this.
We do have a timeframe to meet today, according to the motion. Let's see if we can do it.
3 p.m.
Conservative
Harold Albrecht Conservative Kitchener—Conestoga, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
We're all eager to move ahead with this.
Mr. Chair, there are a couple of points I would like to clarify, and it does speak to the motion in terms of the evidence that's either to be included or not, depending on the motion.
Earlier today, Mr. McGuinty mentioned that I'm a member of the Mennonite Church. Well, one might ask where he would find that kind of information. And it appears to me, Mr. Chair, that it was from his staff.
My question is this. Is that the kind of activity his staff are engaged in, spending their time researching what faith group members belong to? And is that meant to bolster their arguments for personal points?
Mr. Chair, I have never been a member of the Mennonite Church. I have strong relationships with many Mennonite individuals and many Mennonite churches, but in fact, Mr. Chair, I also have strong relationships with many Catholics, many Lutherans, many Anglicans, and I could go on. But my bigger concern, Mr. Chair, is that when I questioned Mr. McGuinty about the source of his information he said it was from my website. I can assure you, Mr. Chair, that my website contains no such statement. So where did he get his information? It turns out he got it from Wikipedia.
I'm wondering if maybe that's where Mr. Martin got his information about the Library of Parliament yesterday, but we'll leave that.
All members know that Wikipedia is a crowd-sourced, unverified source of information that is subject to manipulation. So the same as we saw yesterday, when the coalition banded together to exclude all expert witness on one matter of contempt, today we find their preferred source of facts, or gossip, is Wikipedia.
I ask the member, with all due respect, to apologize for his errors, to withdraw his earlier statement, and to assure this committee that other statements he has attempted to make over the course of these past three days were not sourced via Wikipedia.
3 p.m.
Conservative
Harold Albrecht Conservative Kitchener—Conestoga, ON
Mr. Chair, I also would like to comment about the motion, specifically with regard to two points.
3 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Let's see if we can just deal with that bit of personal news before we deal with the motion.
3 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
If you don't mind, Mr. McGuinty, I'll give you the floor for a short period of time.
3 p.m.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Mr. Chair, I deeply respect Mr. Albrecht's intervention. My staff had nothing to do with this. We did a cursory examination of the BIC website, which shows some links, and I apologize unreservedly to Mr. Albrecht if I have misrepresented any relationship he's had with any church.