Thank you.
That item was because of the famous case in 1839 in Stockdale v. Hansard, which every parliamentary clerk and officer would be aware of. Now, of course, such a report, tabled in the House and published by an order of the House, would be protected by the Parliament of Canada Act.
When the proceedings of Parliament were broadcast, it was provided the persons producing radio and television were employees of Parliament and they produced an electronic Hansard: that is, an audiovisual report of the House without embellishment or editorial. The sittings of committees of the House are also now broadcast. As in the case of the printed Hansard, the electronic Hansard now provided in the House of Commons is a verbatim report of what has transpired audibly and, in the case of television, visually. The debates, whether broadcast or not, nevertheless are still part of debates in Parliament, per article 9 of the Bill of Rights, 1689.
In a study of the privileges of members of the Parliament in Britain, the Select Committee on Broadcasting, in 1966, said that a member of Parliament whose speech is broadcast would continue to be protected by absolute privilege in respect of what she or he said in debate in the House. The member is, in law, speaking on an occasion of absolute privilege, and the means of publication is irrelevant.
Parliamentary privilege is the necessary immunity that the law provides for members to do their legislative work, including the assembly's work in holding the government to account. It is also the necessary immunity that the law provides for anyone taking part in a proceeding in Parliament.
To the question “necessary in relation to what?”, therefore, the answer is necessary to protect legislators in the discharge of their legislative and deliberative functions, and the legislative assembly’s work in holding the government to account for the conduct of the country’s business.
In addition, it is the right, power and authority of each House of Parliament to perform its constitutional functions.
The Supreme Court of Canada pointed out that in the U.K., privileges of Parliament are rights “absolutely necessary for the due execution of its power”, and that “Canadian legislative bodies properly claim as inherent privileges those rights which are necessary to their capacity to function as legislative bodies. There is no dispute in the case law that necessity is the test.”
The sittings of the House of Commons itself and the sittings of a committee of Parliament are constitutionally inherent. Their exercise is not subject to a judicial review and constitutes one of the internal proceedings, and all who participate in them are protected. So anyone participating in a committee of the House or in the House is protected.
The Supreme Court of Canada confirmed that the courts defer to the internal proceedings of legislative bodies, affirmed that the House of Parliament is “the sole judge of the lawfulness of its proceedings” and that this is “fully established” in the United Kingdom, while also approving that “[i]n settling or departing from its own procedure, the House can 'practically change or practically supersede the law'”.
The dictionary definition of “virtual” says, “having the essence or effect but not the appearance or form of”. As in the case of the House of Commons, a virtual sitting of a committee of the House constitutes a sitting and part of the internal proceedings of the House. Parliamentary privilege prevails, in line with the principle that prevails in a proceeding of a virtual court of justice.