Mr. Speaker, I have listened with attention to the initial presentation made by the hon. member and the subsequent statements that were made.
First, I do not believe that Mr. Speaker should be influenced between a criminal case against a civilian and a civil case against a member of parliament. The two comparisons that were made have, quite frankly, nothing to do one with the other and the references to them are immaterial. I do not know what they do to the seriousness of this issue.
I am prepared to acknowledge that the accusations themselves are obviously quite serious. It has been alleged that CSIS offered assistance to a former employee in a civil case involving a member of parliament. It is alleged that this action then constitutes a question of privilege or possibly contempt or both.
If I understood what the hon. member requested, it is that this case should be brought to the attention of a parliamentary committee for review.
Given the seriousness of these accusations, I want to remove the other materials stated by other members of parliament. I do not think some of them had anything to do with this issue.
I would ask Mr. Speaker for a stay on the ruling he intends to give, whether this constitutes a prima facie case of privilege. I would ask that I be given a little time, and possibly other members might want to contribute toward what has been alleged today. In a few short hours we will have a Hansard or at least a fast version of Hansard giving us the details of what the hon. member has said. If I understand correctly, she has offered to table some documents with Mr. Speaker. If some of us could perhaps have those documents made available to us we could further contribute before Mr. Speaker makes his initial determination as to whether this constitutes a prima facie case of privilege.
To repeat what I said earlier, I would ask for a stay in the Speaker's ruling on this matter, given the issue in question and the considerable amount of information made available to us by the member of parliament in question, to permit us to at least examine the material, then contribute and perhaps Mr. Speaker will consider ruling only at that time.