Madam Speaker, it is very interesting that the parliamentary secretary wants to talk about remediation agreements now, as he did not want to talk about them previously. One was narrowly slipped into a budget bill, and it did not have the scrutiny that we would normally expect when making this kind of expansive change to the Criminal Code.
In fact, the former minister of justice, the former attorney general, did not even come to committee to testify about this. A parliamentary secretary went instead. This is very revealing regarding the concerns that the former minister likely had at the time.
The government wants to make this about the type of investigation that could happen and where. As the NDP also understands, there cannot be an effective investigation unless and until the government waives solicitor-client privilege and allows the former attorney general to speak about this. If the government wants a meaningful investigation, regardless of who is doing it, solicitor-client privilege must be waived.
Could the member share more about why solicitor-client privilege is so important for allowing Canadians to get to the bottom of this issue, regardless of who does the investigation?