Mr. Speaker, I stand corrected. I apologize and withdraw that. The secretary of state was served with a subpoena in his constituency office to testify in court about a meeting he had with constituents a few years before. Speaker Fraser ruled: “The service of a subpoena within the precincts of the House of Commons is improper without the permission of the Speaker”.
The member at the time and now secretary of state was asking Speaker Fraser to extend the definition of privilege to encompass something akin to a solicitor-client privilege between an MP and his or her constituents. Speaker Fraser declined to do so. The current secretary of state may have a point in wanting to extend our privileges on that score but I am seeking to limit the blanket waiver against MPs or senators having to testify in court.
I do not believe MPs or senators should have an unfettered privilege to refuse to testify in court as witnesses. The primary claim of parliament to members' attendance no longer demands this blanket waiver. I make reference to the practice created in Britain in the 1600s to safeguard MPs from King Charles I who often imprisoned outspoken politicians. It also prevented poorly paid MPs from being thrown into debtors prison for non-payment of debts. Enshrined in the Canadian Constitution Act of 1867, the privilege grants members the right to speak in parliament without fear of harassment for what he or she says. I still support that privilege without which we would be handcuffed as spokespersons for our constituents and others outside our ridings.
MPs and senators are exempted from jury duty because of their obligation to serve the nation's highest court, parliament. Parliamentary privilege exists to ensure the people's representatives are free to work in the public interest. I maintain and support that point of view.
Beauchesne's and Maingot assert that the two houses of parliament have the first call on the attendance of their members. Fair enough, but that principle was elaborated in the specific rules of privilege before the invention of the airplane. At that time parliament was called for a session that lasted some months and then prorogued at the end. MPs and senators had to travel for up to a week and maybe more sometimes to attend the session. They travelled by train or horse and buggy.
Today a parliamentary session is never prorogued until just before a new session is announced, usually the day before or the day of the new session. However, the House and the Senate adjourn regularly and even predictably because of our calendar. MPs and senators can fly anywhere in Canada in under a day if they really need to. Therefore I believe it is not necessary to assert the primary claim of parliament to members' attendance by giving members an unfettered right to avoid testifying as witnesses in court. MPs or Senators who have information relevant to non-frivolous criminal or civil proceedings should be required to testify like any other Canadian so long as the Chamber is adjourned or prorogued.
Of course as whip of the NDP, I would not want to see a situation where one political party could subpoena MPs from another political party to defeat a government with respect to a vote or ensure that a close vote was passed, for example. But the current blanket privilege makes Canadians believe parliamentarians are above the law.
Many people in Saskatchewan two years ago told me they thought Senator Berntson was exercising his privileges not out of a sense of the importance of his work in the Senate but to avoid giving testimony at one trial that might later lead to his own criminal charges. Although I do not want to comment on a matter that is currently before the courts, I can say that it was not so impossible to see how they might come to that conclusion.
What will happen if the RCMP public complaints commission should subpoena the former solicitor general or the Prime Minister? A subpoena cannot be served on Parliament Hill without the permission of the Speaker. The public complaints commission has the powers of a board of inquiry, but the Prime Minister is saying there is no precedent for him to testify if called.
I do not believe we should give prime ministers or cabinet ministers or MPs any shields to hide behind anymore, in particular as they appear as witnesses. My motion is intended to modernize the rules of parliament and the rules for parliamentarians to maintain public confidence in their elected representatives as well as to ensure an equitable justice system and to make sure that politicians are not above the law.
I hope hon. members will find the motion worthy of support. I look forward to addressing their comments at the end of the hour.