Public Accounts Committee on March 3rd, 2011

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

I will take that opportunity. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First of all, some members questioned whether this was the right forum to bring up a privilege motion. And I'd like to refer to page 1050 of Audrey O’Brien and Bosc. It says:

If a Member wishes to raise a question of privilege during a committee meeting or an incident arises in connection with the committee’s proceedings that may constitute a breach of privilege, the committee Chair allows the Member to explain the situation.

And that's exactly what we've done here today. So I would like to just remind honourable members that this is the right forum, this is the right place to bring up a breach of privilege.

I'd also like to remind the committee members, as the chair and others already have, that we did have the law clerk here and we did have the deputy privacy commissioner here. Both of them specifically cautioned us in the use of these documents. They cautioned us to keep these documents confidential and that the committee decide on how to use these documents.

That has not taken place. The committee has not decided on the use of these documents. Instead, we had one member of the committee decide on his own how to use these documents. Therefore, I think it is of the utmost importance that we decide, without further delay, on how we are going to deal with these documents.

Furthermore, I understand that the most confidential of all of these documents, the document that was supposed to be safeguarded, is now also in the public realm, which is the departure agreement. So I say that without any further delay, we must decide now how we are going to be dealing with these documents going forward.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Mr. D'Amours.

[Jean-Claude D'Amours, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be brief. I will leave some time to Mr. Bains.

I would first of all like to clarify one point. When the Privy Council Office sent us the letter, it clearly stated that it had removed from the information those sensitive and personal elements that could have been a problem.

Secondly, if we want to talk about breach of privilege and attempting to place the blame on others, here is the first question one must ask: how is it that a lawyer was made aware of the fact that the Privy Council Office had provided documents to us? We were made aware of this and we were sent an e-mail less than 24 hours after having ourselves received our documents. This is perhaps the question that should be asked: how is it that someone was aware of the fact that the Privy Council Office had supplied specific documents to us? Therefore, if we are to discuss a breach of privilege, it will be serious business.

Thirdly, I would like to read a paragraph. As I was saying earlier, the sensitive and personal elements in the documents we received were removed by the Privy Council Office. I will read a section of the agreement in French, and my colleague will read the English version.

Section 6 of the agreement reads as follows:The particulars of the Departure Agreement shall be held strictly confidential and shall not be disclosed by any person, unless required by federal or provincial law or regulation, or because of the Minister's responsibility and accountability to Parliament.

Mr. Bains.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Thank you very much. And I can understand the passion of my colleague, because this is a serious issue.

I just want to again say that for Mr. Kramp's purposes, here are the Standing Orders. I double-checked. No rule exists or was established by this committee on whether or not the documents should be held confidential. These documents are public. Madame Faille said that. We could even obtain these through access to information.

And with respect to the departure agreement, because I know it's a sensitive document that's being discussed, in paragraph 6 it also deals with the accountability of Parliament and the point I raise with respect to the public interest, which is clearly spelled out. And this is what we're trying to pursue. I'm going to read this out again, so members understand and it's on the record. It reads:

The particulars of the Departure Agreement shall be held strictly confidential and shall not be disclosed by any person, unless required by federal or provincial law or regulation, or because of the Minister's responsibility and accountability to Parliament....

That's the issue, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Thank you.

Mr. Christopherson.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

While I think I did my summary, I have just one comment on something new that has cropped up. I agree. We have a huge problem. It is a serious issue, these documents that are out there. That is why we brought in the Privacy Commissioner.

What concerns me is that we may have taken a position that some of those documents we will deal with, but they've crossed the line in terms of personal information. We would have at least had that discussion.

But I don't know what action we take now on a crisis basis. To mix my metaphors, the documents are already out the barn door. So yes, let's close the door, but there's no big panic to do it. What we need to do is to figure out.... We have to start the process again. What happened? What do we do to prevent it? Is there some entity that obviously looks like it's to blame? We'll start that whole process.

But In terms of any urgency to the matter, I would suggest to Mr. Saxton, with great respect, that urgency is already gone. Those documents are out there. What we're into now is damage control and trying to put measures in place so it doesn't happen again.

Thanks, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Thank you. I said I would only give one person a crack at it for two minutes.

All right, colleagues, I want to thank Mr. Saxton for bringing the matter up. I noted that he wanted to have it discussed and debated in full committee, not in steering committee, for whatever reason, and that's fine. So he's done it.

As I said, on a personal basis, the only issue I take with that is there was a suggested impugning of my motives as an individual member of Parliament. But I can deal with that; we're all big boys.

I think, Mr. Saxton, on the issue of the substance, number one is that you got the debate you wanted. Number two, I don't see any of the actions you referred to, whether they had merit in your arguments or not, as impeding the work of the House of Commons and therefore constituting a question of privilege. I don't see them as having impeded the ability of this committee to do its work. So I don't see that as a privilege.

I do take the suggestion made by other colleagues around the table that we need to improve the proceedings from the way they have been established since March 2010, and I think that will be a good start for those who want to take that position in steering committee, where the discussion will be productive, and then from there back over to this committee. I suggest that will be the first positive thing going forward.

On everybody's behalf, I'm going to take some exception to any suggestions about the sources of the information, because I took great pains to point out to all of you when everybody got information—of course what I said in the House of Commons is on the record in Hansard—that I made absolutely no reference to anything that was confidential, absolutely none. You'd need a stick 30 miles long to make any connection.

I appreciate the fact that you want to debate. Thank you for bringing it up, and I thank all colleagues for all of this.

I'm going to proceed and suggest that this is not a point of privilege and I'm going to go on.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Mr. Chair, you've said—

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Are you accepting my decision?

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Let me just make one final comment. We have more documentation coming to this committee forthwith. That's why I think there is a sense of urgency that we do this.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Mr. Saxton—

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

You have said yourself that we do have more documentation coming.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

I'll address that. I'm asking whether you accept my decision?

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

I do not accept your decision, but it's your decision.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Are you challenging my decision?

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Yes, we're challenging your decision.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Go ahead. There will be no debate, no amendment. We'll vote immediately.

Shall the chair's ruling be sustained?

(Ruling of the chair sustained)

So it is sustained. I thank colleagues for all of that.

Mr. Saxton, we already suggested a method, going forward. As for the documents we are still to receive, there are two complete sections that are not in both official languages, as I said. I'm going to ask you to use your influence as the parliamentary secretary to the Treasury Board to ensure that those documents be provided to this committee forthwith, according to the motion passed by this committee, so this committee can get on and do its work.

The impediment to the ability of this committee to do its work is not whether members ask questions or whether they get information from anywhere. It's that they not receive the documents that the motions of this committee demand.

Mr. Christopherson.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Chair, at the risk of opening up a new front, my understanding, as reflected in my comments, was that all the documents we're dealing with have already been sent. But I'm reminded by Mr. Saxton, and you, that we've got a whole load of other documents, and certainly we on this side of the committee would urge that there be the same pressure on the government to deliver.

However, my point is that given the fact that we did not have an opportunity to make a determination on whether or not the first batch—I'll call everything up until now the first batch—should be kept confidential, I, for one, would argue we at least should have started on that agreement in camera...just to be safe, based on the advice we got and the fact that it was meant to be confidential.

It's all out there now, and it says so in there—it was part of the agreement. Therefore we may have concluded there was no public good to be served by exercising our right to overlook the legislation that otherwise would have protected a citizen. At least it would have been a point of debate; I think that's fair.

Believe me, I'm the last guy who wants to complicate things. But in going forward and trying to be responsible, should we now put some measure in place that puts a better guarantee, not on our access to it, but on our ability to better ensure that the material, given that some of it may or may not be deemed by us to be confidential, has not been made...?

I throw that out there, Chair, and I seek guidance from you and thoughts from others. I'm a little reticent to let it go, given what's already transpired.

I don't want to get into a long process, and it's not in any way meant to tell the government it's okay that they seem to be dragging their heels—that's my comment—on delivering these documents. But I am concerned about us closing our eyes to what we've witnessed here and allowing something to happen.

But maybe I'm being overly concerned about it, so I will listen to my colleagues.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Mr. Christopherson, I want to thank you for raising that. I was actually going to go on to something related to that as part of our business agenda. I know there are others here, including Mr. Kramp and Mr. Bains, who want to make an intervention.

While the debate may be very useful, I think what you have said, on three occasions now, is you want us to think about going forward, both with what we have and what we're going to get, so we provide ourselves with a bit of guidance. I propose to do that in a moment.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

I raised it, but if you recall, I was saying there's nothing acute about it in this case; we've got time to put measures in place. Now I'm suggesting maybe that's not the case. Do we need to take some kind of action to show the public we've learned from this lesson?

Again, others may say let it rip, but I'm concerned. There may be other documents that, if given a chance, we may decide they should be kept private, for very good reasons, and there may be all-party support around that. That has yet to happen with what we're about to receive. It didn't happen with the first batch, and look what happened.

I'm sorry to go on, Chair. I'm just saying that in your remarks summarizing what I said, I'm suggesting that perhaps Mr. Saxton has a point around the documents we haven't yet received. I'm asking should we do something.

I'm not even sure this is a good idea, but I will throw it out to start. Should we, for the time being, keep all those documents in the hands of the clerk? That's not to slow it down, but in the normal course of events we will go in camera to look at the documents and make some determination then.

Remember, the government does not have majority control over this committee. They can't use that process to shut down documents from being let out.

I am asking colleagues, do we not have an obligation, given what's already happened, to be a little more...? The word escapes me. It's been a long day. You know what I mean.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

Mr. Christopherson, I'm actually looking for the next step, and I appreciate the introduction to that.

Mr. Kramp.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Precisely, Dave, you're dead on. But it goes right to the crux of the simplicity of my starting point. We already have a solution. It is in place. It has been in place and it is legislated. It is in O'Brien and Bosc on page 1071:

A document submitted to a committee becomes the property of the committee and forms part of the committee's records. Each committee must decide whether such documents will be made public or kept confidential.

We just make a decision; it doesn't matter what the decision is, but the committee makes a decision. If it's kept confidential because the numbers on the committee dictate, it's kept confidential. If the committee numbers dictate that it's let out, then it's let out. That is the way it should be going forward, and that is the way, regrettably, it should have been in the past. That's the whole point of this argument today.

If we're going forward, then we simply have to say we have to have a level of control. Otherwise, we are going to have a continuation of what we have now. If the information comes into the committee, the committee decides, and so be it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

You've made the point. Thank you, Mr. Kramp.

Mr. Bains.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair.

I just wanted a point of clarification actually with Mr. Christopherson's remarks in terms of documents. I guess it's up for the discussion. I clearly understood that it's going forward and we're trying to determine the path forward now with these documents.

Again, I want to make the point that Mr. Saxton is talking about on how we deal with this.

We already spoke with the Office of the Privacy Commissioner. We already addressed this issue before. It was determined that as long as we demonstrate we're pursuing the public interest and we're showing good judgment, we can continue to proceed. And that's what we're doing.

Madame Faille has made it very clear that these documents can be made available through access to information. It is just that we are dealing with it because we as a committee have a mandate to deal with an issue with respect to the report that came out by the Auditor General. We have been dealing with this issue for four months now. It's not just for four days or four weeks; we've been dealing with this information for a very long time.

I would like to table the Standing Orders, for Mr. Kramp's purposes, just to make sure we get this confusion out of the way with respect to these documents being public. This clearly again highlights the fact--

[The Chair, Liberal, Joe Volpe]

He has a copy.

Mr. Saxton.