Mr. Speaker, I undertook yesterday to investigate the complaint made by the hon. member for Red Deer and others concerning the alleged leak of the government response to a report of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade and I now wish to report to the House on that matter.
First, to put the matter into context, I should point out that the more common method of tabling such responses is by depositing them with the Clerk of the House, pursuant to Standing Order 32(1). As a consequence, such responses are often given little public profile and may even escape the attention of members. In this case the government believed that the issue at hand required public attention and chose to table the response along with an outline of its position on the general question raised in the House itself. The intent of the government was not to try to obscure the report from hon. members, but was quite the opposite; that is, to draw it to their immediate attention.
Unfortunately, it was evident from an article in the media over the weekend that someone with at least basic knowledge of the position arrived at by the government chose to convey such information without authority and quite probably unlawfully to at least one journalist. It does not appear from the article in question that the writer actually had a copy of the material tabled on Monday, but of course who knows? However, somebody obviously improperly relayed information which was at that stage still a cabinet confidence.
Officials in several departments were privy to this information and it is therefore quite impossible, at this stage at least, to identify the culprit. I wish to assure the House that such unauthorized release of information is not condoned by the government, least of all by myself, and that a full investigation by the proper authorities is under way on this matter.
The hon. member for Red Deer indicated that a journalist contacted him some three hours—I believe that was the number he gave—before the documents were tabled, claiming to have a copy. I regret to report that two journalists were given copies of the material sometime between 1.30 p.m. and 2 p.m.—not three hours before—on an embargoed basis. Even though the journalists in question appeared to have abided by the undertakings of the embargo, I regard this release as an error in judgment nonetheless.
I want to tell the House that it is definitely not the regular practice of the government to provide advance copies of material to be tabled in the House to the media unless comparable arrangements are made for relevant opposition spokespersons, as is done on matters such as the budget. I must assure the House that I will draw this matter to the attention of my colleagues in an effort to avoid such discourtesy in the future. I will come back to this point a little later in my remarks.