Mr. Speaker, as you know, during question period you cut off an answer by the NDP vice-chair of the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food.
I am really hoping that you can clarify that decision, since you and every Speaker before you have ruled that the Speaker has no ability to judge the quality or the content of answers given during question period.
In fact, Bosc and Gagnon tells us, at page 516 that:
The Speaker ensures that replies adhere to the standards of order, decorum and parliamentary language, but is not responsible for the quality or content of replies to questions.
The member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford was responding and telling us about some of the very important work being done at the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food.
This is just a question of ours. Is it a double-standard that we see, or is the House now to understand that today's precedent will be applied to answers by the government side of the House from now on? We are hoping that it is the latter.