Mr. Speaker, I am quite taken by surprise by this question of privilege and I certainly take it very, very seriously.
But let me begin in my own defence by saying that I only wish that I did have some of the information that was discussed in camera with respect to the private members' bills that were deemed votable or not votable.
As you are very well aware, Mr. Speaker, one of the awkward things about this subcommittee is it is dominated by the opposition members. It deliberates in camera. A report is tabled in the House and there is no opportunity at any time for the members affected by whether their bill is chosen to be votable or non-votable. There is no opportunity at anytime to know the reason why the bill is deemed votable or not votable.
Now, if I may just go through my letter. I think I need to defend myself. I am sure, Mr. Speaker, you will agree that I have not said anything in my letter that besmirches the reputations of my colleagues opposite, nor in any sense, shall we say deviates from the information that I have fairly acquired.
First of all, the first paragraph said:
My Bill C-234 to amend the Supreme Court Act was ruled non-votable by the opposition members on the sub-committee for private members' business even though it met all the criteria for votability.
I invite you, Mr. Speaker, to examine my bill versus the known criteria for votability and you will find there is no argument. It met every one of those criteria for votability.
As far as my knowing that the opposition members voted against making my bill votable, I can assure the House that that arises from the fact that I had and still have great confidence that certainly the Liberal member on the subcommittee for private members' business would not have argued against his own colleague's bill. So by elimination, Mr. Speaker, it was very clear that the opposition members, now by their own admission, Mr. Speaker, in this Chamber, now the opposition members do admit that they did speak against my bill.
The second paragraph said:
The bill would have required the Supreme Court to consider the intent of parliament when considering Charter cases. It would also have prevented the government from broadly applying split-decisions like that of Marshall where the Micmac were given an aboriginal right to the fishery.
Mr. Speaker, you will agree that there is nothing contentious in that, which merits a point of privilege. It is a mere statement of the truth and a mere statement of what my bill would have done.
I think the third paragraph may have caused a little bit of awkwardness on the part of my colleagues opposite, where I say:
Crude partisanship has thus deprived all MPs of a debate on judicial activism and judge-made Charter law that most of us have been crying out for.
I submit, first and foremost that in this place of all places, to accuse another member of being partisan is one of the most normal things that could possibly occur here, because indeed more often than not, particularly during question period, we pride ourselves on being partisan.
Perhaps the adjective “crude” was a little offensive. But, Mr. Speaker, I would draw your attention to the fact that when items are selected for their votability, among the many items that come before the subcommittee, is that they have the option of selecting 10 items. In this instance they only selected seven. They could have selected three Liberal items.
I point out that it was not only me that had an item before the committee. The member for Davenport and the member for Lac-Saint-Louis, both Liberal members, also had items before the committee yet they were not chosen to be votable.
I can only conclude, as a member, that crude partisanship must have taken effect because all three of these Liberal items met all the criteria. If the people who were deliberating on this wanted to reject other opposition bills, that was perfectly fair. But I really do feel that there is no point of privilege here. As I stated:
Opposition MPs have been complaining about the lack of opportunity of backbench MPs and the irrelevance of Parliament. Yet when given a chance to do something about it, they failed to take it.
Mr. Speaker, I merely stated the truth.