Mr. Speaker, I gave notice of this question of privilege with regard to the bill that has just been tabled in the House, Canada's clean air act. In the documents I provided you this morning was a copy of the draft bill which was circulated by the Sierra Club and other environmental groups on Friday, October 13 at a press conference in the Charles Lynch Theatre where they were giving their commentary on the various provisions of the bill.
This morning, the government held a lock-up for the media from 9:00 a.m. to 10:15 a.m., as evidence of the necessity for maintaining confidentiality and secrecy of a government bill until it is duly tabled in the House, which was just done. Under the rules of Parliament, government bills are secret until they are tabled in the House for the first reading so the public does not know before Parliament knows. In the case where there is a contravention of that, it is, I believe, a prima facie matter of a breach of my and all hon. members' parliamentary privilege that there was a leak of a bill prior to it being tabled in the House.
If any cabinet minister, official or other person who had access to the bill releases such bill, it still remains the responsibility of the government House leader or his authorized designate to ensure the secrecy provisions are protected until the bill is tabled. This is obviously done so that no other party has a substantial advantage or in fact disadvantage.
Mr. Speaker, in the document that was presented at the October 13 press conference, which I provided to you, you will note that on the top of the page where we would normally see the word “secret”, the word has been whited out or blacked out so that it is unreadable. However, you will also note that on page 10 of the document the word “secret“ was inadvertently missed and not blacked out.
Mr. Speaker, on the basis of the information that I have provided to you, I believe there is substantive evidence that a secret document has been circulated in the public domain prior to it being tabled in Parliament, which would appear to constitute a breach of parliamentary privilege.
If the Speaker should find a prima facie case of a breach of privilege, I am prepared to move the appropriate motion.