Mr. Speaker, I raised a question of privilege on November 2, 1994 regarding an incident that arose from question period on November 1, 1994.
As you are aware, Mr. Speaker, the Deputy Prime Minister quoted from a letter I wrote to the Minister of Canadian Heritage regarding a concern of one of my constituents. This was done without my prior knowledge or permission or the prior knowledge or permission of my constituent.
At that time the Deputy Prime Minister stood in the House and argued that the letter was public domain. It was on this argument that the matter was dropped.
Since then I have received a copy of a letter from the CRTC to my constituent which was in response to my letter. In the letter from the CRTC the manager of correspondence and complaints division writes: "In accordance with your rights and the CRTC's obligations under the Privacy Act, unless you advise the commission otherwise, within three weeks of the date of this letter it will follow the usual practice of placing a copy of all correspondence related to your complaint on the licensee's publicly accessible file".
Clearly the CRTC regards the correspondence relating to my constituent's complaint as private as defined in the Privacy Act.
The letter from the CRTC is dated December 13, 1994. Considering the three-week requirement before making the correspondence public, my letter to the minister was not a public document until January 3, 1995.
The Deputy Prime Minister quoted from my letter relating to my constituent's complaint on November 1, 1994, two months before the letter was deemed a public document.
In light of this new information, Mr. Speaker, I ask that you reconsider the matter. If in your deliberations of whether what I raise today constitutes a prima facie question of privilege, I ask that you consider the following.
By making my private letter available to the Deputy Prime Minister, the Minister of Canadian Heritage breached confidentiality. In so doing he interfered with my ability to function as a member of Parliament by calling into question whether issues on which constituents asked my assistance will be made public.
Mr. Speaker, I ask that you find this to be a prima facie question of privilege. If you do so find, as is the usual practice of the House, as described in Beauchesne's sixth edition, citation 118, I will move that this question of privilege be referred to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.