I have to tell you it's your lucky day. You should buy a lottery ticket today, Ralph, because I've sat exactly where you have, but provincially, at Queen's Park. In the day, you were titled the Solicitor General of Canada. As the Solicitor General of Ontario, I sat exactly there. I had exactly the same relationship with the OPP as you have with the RCMP. I was listening intently to see if there was anything that just didn't wash in terms of my own experience, having walked down that road.
I have to tell you, colleagues, I'm open to it. I'm wide open to seeing whether there's something wrong—like, really wrong—but beyond the mistake, as it looks like it was.... I'll end where the minister ended—that is, where we go forward. I don't see anything showing that anybody was trying to do anything other than their job. If there's anything different from anyone, I want to hear it. I'm more than willing to pull that thread, because this is important. I have to say, though, that having now gone through this for the second go-round, I'm not seeing anything that would have us go any further.
Minister, again, I think at the last meeting I said we needed to see the appropriate bowing and scraping and hear that it won't happen again. You've done that, and that's appropriate. It's most appropriate that the executive recognize that Parliament is paramount. When the executive has violated the rights of Parliament, it's Parliament that has to hold the executive to account. In a proper democracy, that executive recognizes that they've been slapped on the wrist, by Parliament, and promise not to do it again. That's what happened, so as far as I'm concerned, I'm seeing a conclusion coming to this. If somebody can find areas where we should go on, though, I'm open.
I am interested in pursuing this idea. I was thinking about it, Minister, as you were going through this.
And, Commissioner, I was thinking about your role in all of this. There is that business of where the government sets out what they're going to do. The government then has a right to give an argument about what they're doing. Then there's the politics of things, where you're spinning things and there's all the stuff we do as politicians. It's perfectly legit. That's part of the process. But they're very distinct, and in this case those lines have crossed over.
So how do we do that? We've been here before. I've been here with this federally, as some of our colleagues have. I've been through this provincially. We've run into the same sort of thing, and the Speaker has come down, but I've never heard anybody offer a fix. Maybe we should take the minister's idea and at some point see if we can help suss it out: How does a government do that? How do they do those three things? There's the government that says what they're going to do; there's the bureaucracy that explains things and tells people; and then there's the politics of things.
If I had any concerns, it was with this idea or assumption that the legislation would go through unamended. That's not necessarily the case. That's getting a little risky. That's why the idea of how much spinning and explanation, and where that happens, is really important, because it's only the beginning of the process. It's not the law just because the Prime Minister and minister say so. It has to go through, and it may not be the same thing at the end of the day. Given that Parliament is a free entity, it may not carry. You never know, even though there's full expectation there.
On that business of going forward, if you're explaining, how do you acknowledge—I'm now going down the sort of rabbit hole that you suggested we jump into, Minister—or how do you then start advocating for something as a bureaucracy when it could still be amended, which could take it into a whole other discussion? I think there's merit in pursuing this a little further, even if we just provide some dialogue, some language, or anything at all to further the ability to keep these things separate.
I don't have even one good table-pounding point to make, Chair, because the minister covered it all.
Having said all of that, I'm listening to colleagues, but I for one think we've come to the end of the road on this one. Other than following up on the suggestion of the minister, is there anything we can do to help Parliament and government prevent this from happening again?
Thank you, sir.
