Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The parliamentary privilege in this particular case that has been infringed upon is that essentially there's a well-established practice and accepted convention that the House of Commons has the right of first access to the text of bills it will consider.
What does that mean? Precise legislative information cannot be distributed to the public before being made accessible to members. Members have a right to this information in order to perform their parliamentary functions. It also reflects the practice that the House plays a pre-eminent role in the legislative affairs of the country. So in practice that means, once notice of a bill is given, the text of that bill is confidential.
Speakers have ruled, and this committee has reported, that when precise legislative information is made available to the public and not to members, it impedes, obstructs, and disadvantages members. So this is what the Speaker would have ruled most recently.
I would note, though, that a practice does exist of a courtesy copy being given to opposition critics of the bill just so they are able to study it before it's introduced in the House.