Pierre Paquette

[Electoral Boundary Readjustment, May 14th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, the more time passes, the more Quebeckers are realizing that this government's claims of greater openness towards Quebec are nothing more than smoke and mirrors used during the election campaign to appeal to Quebeckers.

If the Prime Minister planned to marginalize Quebec, as the bill for reform of democratic representation introduced here in this House will certainly do, why did he not show greater transparency and talk to Quebeckers about this during his speech in Quebec in 2005?

[Gasoline Prices, May 10th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, the problem is that prices are inflated because of the oil companies' excessive profits. On Tuesday, the minister confirmed that the refining margin was 22¢ a litre. That is three times the average margin early in this decade. The price at the pump comes under Quebec's jurisdiction, we know, but the refining margin is a question of competition, which is a federal jurisdiction.

Is the Prime Minister aware that by refusing to give the Competition Bureau more power, he is condoning a situation that is hurting consumers and the economy yet benefiting the oil companies?

[Gasoline Prices, May 10th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, a study released today confirms our fears. Consumers in Quebec and Canada are paying too much for their gas. According to the study, the price per litre is 15¢ too high, and production costs cannot account for this. This unexplained difference raises the question of whether the oil companies are really competing with one another. Competition is a federal jurisdiction.

Will the Prime Minister shoulder his responsibilities and act on the Bloc Québécois motion passed on Tuesday in this House by amending the Competition Act to strengthen it and give the commissioner of competition and the Competition Bureau more power?

[Business of Supply, May 8th, 2007]

Naturally.

[Business of Supply, May 8th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his question. One has to wonder why Canadian oil companies—and U.S. companies, too—have closed so many refineries.

I understand very well that they wanted to streamline operations in order to increase productivity. When supply more or less matches demand and there are extraordinary circumstances—an international event, or hurricane Katrina, or an ice storm—they do not have the necessary reserves to absorb the rise in prices and so prices skyrocket. I do not understand why the oil companies do not have these reserves that would enable them to weather the storm.

Perhaps the federal government should force them to establish such reserves—or perhaps the government should do so itself—to avoid this type of situation. One has to wonder if this is what the oil companies were hoping for. It may not necessarily be collusion but not producing enough at the refinery creates an artificial shortage or artificial pressure on prices. We must take a closer look. The purpose of the motion is to shed light on the issue and to find the means to decrease the supply-side pressure toward price increases, while ensuring the availability of gas when needed.

I will close by saying that heavy demand during periods such as the Easter and Christmas holidays and the construction holidays are not unpredictable. These events occur at the same time every year. How is it that prices magically increase?

[Business of Supply, May 8th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very good question. It is as interesting as the hon. member for Roberval—Lac-Saint-Jean.

Everyone agrees on the Competition Act. The government says that the price at the pump is the responsibility of the provinces and Quebec, but that is just another excuse. Profits are not made at the pump; they are made at the refinery.

We want to know why the refining margin has gone, as I have already mentioned, from 8¢ or 9¢ to 26¢ in the past few years.

As I said, price setting needs to be transferred from the criminal section of the Competition Act—where it is now—to the civil part of the act because the burden of proof is lower in a civil case.

Furthermore, as far as the Competition Act is concerned, a petroleum monitoring agency needs to be created in order to monitor what is going on and to be able to provide information to the public. Consumers would know exactly what is happening and under what conditions things are happening. It seems to me that with these two items, we would have the means to discipline the major oil companies in relation to setting the price at the pump.

Obviously this would not solve all the problems. The real solution to this problem is to cut our dependence on oil and gas, which is what we should be doing in Canada and Quebec.

[Business of Supply, May 8th, 2007]

moved:

That, in the opinion of the House, the government should move an amendment to the Competition Act so that the Commissioner of Competition have the power to initiate investigations of the price of gas and the role of refining margins in the determination of the said price.

Mr. Speaker, I believe that this debate affects all Canadians. Directly or indirectly, we are all gas consumers. The vehicles we use, whether cars or buses, run on gas or petroleum products. Consumers are also affected indirectly because what we buy is often transported by truck. This is therefore an extremely important debate.

As was mentioned, the motion asks:

That, in the opinion of the House, the government should move an amendment to the Competition Act so that the Commissioner of Competition have the power to initiate investigations of the price of gas and the role of refining margins in the determination of the said price.

The government is fond of saying that prices at the pump are determined by market forces.

Mr. Speaker, before I go on, I would like to say that I will be sharing my time with the member for Trois-Rivières. I believe that you already guessed as much.

The government and the big oil companies have often said that the price consumers pay is determined solely by market forces, which in turn are affected by international economic factors more than anything else.

This is a simplistic argument. Everyone knows that international events play a role in determining gas prices at the pump, but other factors also come into play. Moreover, if countries everywhere, and especially industrialized nations, were to exercise more self-discipline in terms of supply and use, we could easily exert greater control over this factor.

It is a poor, incomplete argument that lets the government shirk its responsibility to ensure that consumers and the public get their money's worth.

A second thing often mentioned is taxes. It is often the industry that brings this up. I remember hearing Carol Montreuil say during an interview on TVA on May 3 that the average profit per litre was around 2¢, while the government takes close to 40¢ per litre in taxes.

Obviously there are a number of issues raised in the statement of Mr. Montreuil, who, I would remind the House, is a spokesperson for the Canadian Petroleum Products Institute. First, the 2¢ he is referring to probably represents the retailer's margin. This margin usually varies between 3.5¢ and 6¢ per litre.

We can see that this is not a very big part of the significant variations that have been seen in the price of gas. I doubt that this 2¢ refers to the refining margins, which are much more problematic. This is why the motion specifically identifies the role of refining margins in determining the price at the pump as a factor that could explain this variation. I will come back to this later. However, what is interesting about the role of taxes is that someone who has been closely following the evolution of the gasoline market, especially in Quebec, in the greater Montreal area, sent me the calculations he did after hearing Mr. Montreuil's comments. I want to share them because I think they bring up an interesting question. There is no answer, but the question reflects the relevance of our motion.

He says:

Take the federal government, for example. There is the 10¢ excise tax and the 6% GST, which adds up to an average revenue of 16¢ per litre.

That is 16¢ per litre in federal taxes.

Approximately 30 billion litres are sold in Canada, netting the federal government $4.8 billion.

That means $4.8 billion in federal gas tax revenues. I will go on.

Taken together, Shell Canada and Esso recorded profits of $4.74 billion.

That is about the same amount collected in federal gas taxes. Combined profits of $4.74 billion is exactly what the federal government brings in. He asks the following question.

How can the government amass $4.8 billion by collecting 16¢ on every litre sold in Canada—

He noted that Shell Canada, with its 45% share of the refining industry, refines 1.8 million barrels a day and makes just two cents per litre but generates the same amount of revenue as the federal government. Something does not add up here if the federal government makes $4.8 billion with its 16¢ per litre while the two oil companies I mentioned, Shell and Esso, who make up 45% of the refining market, make as much as the federal government two cents per litre at a time.

So they ask themselves the question. Are they in fact perhaps making more than 2¢ per litre? That is the question we are seeking to answer in our motion. We want to find ways to get answers to the questions that people are asking themselves, that we are asking ourselves—extremely legitimate questions.

The major problem is that the Competition Act is not as stringent as it needs to be for the investigations that the commissioner might conduct to produce results. On the government side, they will tell us that there have been six investigations and that no one has ever been able to prove collusion. We are not saying there is collusion; we simply want the Competition Bureau to have the means to carry out these investigations, and that is what we are proposing in this motion.

Obviously, this is not the only solution, nor the only partial solution, that is needed. There will be others, and I know that the member for Trois-Rivières will be amending my motion shortly to include the petroleum monitoring agency and also to move to amend the act to decriminalize the anti-competitive pricing practices. That is, that the criminal offences attached to investigations into price-fixing—in particular, gasoline pricing, but it would apply to all prices—be eliminated, and be made civil issues instead.

I would like to come back to the refinery margins. As I said, the retailer's margin is 3.5¢ to 6¢ per litre. We think that this margin is relatively reasonable, and it has been stable over time. On the other hand, refinery margins have risen from an average of 6¢ or 7¢, which they were from 1998 to 2003, to the present average of 26¢ per litre.

How can we explain the refinery margin having risen so high, when the average in recent years, in the late 1990s and early part of this century, ranged back and forth between 6¢ and 8¢? According to the Association québécoise des indépendants du pétrole, at a 6¢ per litre profit to refineries, the oil companies are already making very attractive profits.

In the current situation, the five biggest oil companies control 90% of the refining market and are making excess profits of about 20¢ a litre. That amounts to $10 for every 50-litre fill-up we get. That means that wealth is being transferred from the public, from consumers, to the oil industry, which is already heavily favoured by this government, in terms of the tax system and the environment. We will have an opportunity to come back to this. As a result, we wonder about the reason for this excessive 26¢ margin. Obviously I am talking about an average for the 2006-07 year.

Recently, I heard Mr. Montreuil say again that in February the refinery margin was 0¢. Of course, he chose the worst month. However, based on the average, which is the indicator of the real situation, the margin is 26¢. Last year, it was about 19¢ or 20¢. So it has risen steadily. In our view, not only do we have to ask questions, but we must also be in a position to get some answers.

Obviously, refining operations are distributed regionally, as we have heard. For example, in the Montreal area, Petro-Canada and Shell do the refining. In the Quebec City area, it is Ultramar. In New Brunswick, Irving does it and in Nova Scotia, I believe it is Esso. Refining is currently experiencing an undercapacity. Is that intentional or not? These questions must be asked. Why is it that oil companies do not have any reserves and when disaster strikes, for instance, the price increases, but comes back down very little? Also, why is it that they cannot seem to plan ahead for the construction holidays, even though they always occur at the same time every year? These things can be anticipated, although, as we all know, a few days before the construction holidays or any other holiday, the price goes up.

The Competition Act therefore needs to be amended, first of all, to give the commissioner the authority to launch investigations, as needed. The commissioner must also be able to request that documents be submitted as evidence, which is currently not the case. The Competition Bureau needs to have real powers in order to properly complete the necessary investigations and to provide us with answers to our entirely legitimate questions.

Once again, I would like to say that we have no evidence of collusion. That is a fact. Perhaps there is no collusion at all. It would be in the best interests of the major oil companies, I think, for the Competition Act to be more rigorous in order to bring greater transparency to the situation and, by answering our questions, to dispel any doubts.

I therefore urge all members here in this House to vote in favour of this Bloc Québécois motion.

[Senate Appointment Consultations Act, May 7th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague asked a number of questions just now. I will start by addressing the last one because it is extremely relevant. It shows how important the Bloc's presence is here in Ottawa as long as Quebec is part of the Canadian Confederation, which we hope will not be for much longer, but that is the subject of another debate.

The member is right. In 1979 or 1980—I do not remember exactly when the vote took place—73 or 74 Liberals voted for this bill. As far as I know, three members—two Liberals and one Conservative, Roch LaSalle, the member for Joliette, if I may remind the members—voted against it. At that time, nobody in the House of Commons—except for a few individuals—was particularly concerned about protecting Quebec's rights as a nation. Now we have a political party that represents a large proportion of the people of Quebec, who believe that they are a nation and that that nation should have everything it needs to develop fully, including a country of its own.

The Bloc Québécois' presence here has done away with the schizophrenia that existed back then. Had the Bloc Québécois been around for that vote, there might have been 50 Bloc Québécois members voting against the unilateral patriation of the Constitution. Obviously, this debate is ongoing in Quebec and is far from over.

I would like to clarify something else. We do not want to reform the Senate. We are not here to reform Canadian institutions. We want out. We will not stop amendments that may be relevant on a democratic level—like the amendment to the Canada Elections Act concerning campaign financing—but we are not here to make major changes to federal institutions. We are here because we want out.

[Senate Appointment Consultations Act, May 7th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, taking part in this debate on Bill C-43, is a little like going to the dentist. Personally, it is the last thing I want to be doing, but what can I say, sometimes we need to go to the dentist. However, we never need to go to the tooth puller.

I truly think the bill before us is of absolute no relevance. It addresses a very secondary matter to the detriment of more pressing priorities than the proposed reform, and that the Conservative government should be concerned about.

Bill C-43 provides for the consultation of electors in a province with respect to their preferences for the appointment of senators to represent the province.

Part 1 provides for the administration of a consultation, which is exercised under the general direction and supervision of the Chief Electoral Officer.

Part 2 provides for the holding of a consultation, initiated by an order of the governor in council.

Part 3 provides for a process whereby prospective nominees may confirm their nominations with the Chief Electoral Officer.

Part 4 addresses voting by electors in a consultation.

Part 5 sets out the rules for the counting of votes pursuant to a preferential system, which takes into account the first and subsequent preferences of electors as indicated on their ballots.

Parts 6 and 7 deal with communications and third party advertising in relation to consultations.

Part 8 addresses financial administration by nominees.

Part 9 provides for the enforcement of the enactment, including the establishment of offences and punishments for contraventions of certain provisions.

Part 10 contains transitional provisions, consequential amendments to the Canada Elections Act and the Income Tax Act, coordinating amendments and commencement provisions.

As I mentioned from the outset, the bill is irrelevant. First, it is quite clear to us that the government, the House of Commons, cannot unilaterally change the Senate without the Constitution being changed. Since the Constitution is a federal constitution, all the stakeholders, in other words, all the provinces, Quebec, the federal government, the parliaments of these different jurisdictions, have to take part in the reform process.

As I said at the beginning, we do not think this bill is appropriate because what we really need is something that includes a review of the Constitution. In the late 1970s, the Supreme Court of Canada studied Parliament's ability to unilaterally amend the constitutional provisions concerning the Senate and, in a 1980 decision concerning Parliament's jurisdiction over the upper chamber, decided Parliament could not unilaterally make decisions about major changes to the essential character of the Senate.

It is likely this legislation will encounter opposition from the provinces, including Quebec. Quebec is not the only province that does not support this government's approach in tabling this bill. The government is heading down a path that leads to the reform of an institution whose relevance is in doubt. Even so, the proposed reform is a minor one.

Do they seriously think that a constitutional negotiation process—which would be necessary, as I said—makes sense right now when the government and Parliament should focus their attention on far more important issues? Just consider reintegrating Quebec into the Constitution that Pierre Elliott Trudeau unilaterally patriated.

All of Quebec's governments, regardless of whether they were Liberal or Parti Québécois, have refused to sign the Constitution as it was patriated in the early 1980s. I would note that there is a three-party consensus on this in the National Assembly among the Liberal Party of Quebec, the Parti Québécois and the Action Démocratique du Québéc.

It is clear to us that neither the powers of the Senate, nor the senator selection method, nor the number of senators for each province, nor the residency requirements for senators can be changed without going through the usual amendment procedure set out in section 38 of the Constitution Act, 1982, which requires the consent of the Senate, the House of Commons, and the legislative assemblies of at least two thirds of the provinces, that is, seven provinces, making up at least 50% of Canada's population.

This is the famous 7/50 formula.

We can see that this bill is irrelevant and could even be harmful, setting in motion a round of constitutional negotiations on a relatively minor issue, as I said. On September 21, 2006, Quebec's intergovernmental affairs minister, Benoît Pelletier—who was recently reappointed—testified before the Special Senate Committee on Senate Reform, where he stated:

—from the Quebec government perspective, clearly any future transformation of the Senate into an elected chamber would be an issue that should be dealt with through constitutional negotiations and not simply through unilateral federal action.

He added:

If the Senate becomes a chamber of elected representatives, its original purpose would be changed. Whether this is achieved directly or indirectly, it becomes an extremely important change which must be debated within the framework of constitutional discussions.

So as I mentioned, Quebec's intergovernmental affairs minister, Benoît Pelletier, simply reiterated Quebec's traditional position to the senate committee by saying two things: first, that the federal government cannot reform the Senate unilaterally, and second, that the federal government cannot achieve indirectly what it cannot achieve directly. Clearly, introducing this bill is a way of doing indirectly what the government does not want to do directly.

As I said earlier, Quebec is not alone in its opposition to electing senators. The premiers of Saskatchewan and Manitoba have called on the government to abolish the Senate instead of trying to reform it. Even the premier of Ontario has expressed serious doubts, saying that electing senators would exacerbate inequalities, under the Senate's current mandate.

Electing senators indirectly would change the relationship between the House of Commons and the Senate and create confusion. I will come back to this. These changes cannot be made unilaterally without the consent of Quebec and the provinces, as Quebec is now recognized as a nation by the House of Commons. Everyone will appreciate that such a reform would be most unwelcome and would not be in keeping with the spirit of either the Constitution or what has been passed in this House.

I said that the first reason this bill is irrelevant is that it will inevitably lead to a round of constitutional negotiations, which do not make a great deal of sense, whether they concern the Senate or just the election of senators. Therefore, once again, if the government goes ahead, it will come up against this constitutional problem.

The second thing that, to me, makes this bill irrelevant, is that, even reformed by Bill C-43, the Senate is still an useless institution. Originally, the Senate was supposed to be a chamber of sober second thought. It was also supposed to protect regional interests. But when we look at the current makeup of the Senate, we see that the appointments were clearly partisan, which has distorted the nature or mandate of the Senate.

Introducing the election of senators will not resolve the issue, because senators will sooner or later have to affiliate themselves with a political party in order to have the necessary resources for the elections. So the Senate will become more partisan and we will depart even further from its original purpose, which, in my opinion, is no longer relevant in the 21st century.

As I was saying, the indirect election of senators would not improve this situation. On the contrary, the electoral process will tend to increase the role of political parties and indirectly elected senators could become concerned with things that now fall under the authority of the House of Commons. This would create a duplication, or, at the very least, confusion, at a cost of $77 million a year. We think this is an extremely high cost for an institution that is not only useless, but that , in the case of the proposed reform, would create confusion and a significant duplication of legitimacy.

It is important to note that because of the evolution of the democratic process in Canada, in the provinces and in Quebec, no province has had an upper house since 1968.

It is interesting to note that members of several provincial upper houses—unlike the Senate of Canada—once had to earn their election, for example, Prince Edward Island. Such upper houses have disappeared over the years, however. Quebec abolished its legislative council in 1968. That was nearly 40 years ago.

Furthermore, I feel it is important to point out another factor. Bill C-43 is irrelevant. Despite the amendments proposed by the bill, the Senate would not be truly democratic. The indirect election by Canadians would give the Senate a superficial democratic credibility. In many respects, the Senate would remain a democratic aberration.

First of all, public consultation is not binding. The bill provides for public consultation, but does not talk about an election, per se, in order to select senators. The Prime Minister maintains the authority to appoint or not appoint the senators chosen by the public and could therefore decide not to appoint a candidate selected in the election process. In one of the background papers provided by the government concerning this bill, it states:

The Prime Minister can take into account the results of the consultation when making recommendations to the Governor General regarding future representatives of a province or territory in the Senate.

Furthermore, how can we trust this Prime Minister, who did not hesitate to appoint Michael Fortier to the Senate, even though he himself criticized the Liberals' partisan appointments? We therefore see that this new Conservative government—which is no longer new, since it has been in power for 15 or 16 months—simply copied the Liberal method of appointing senators.

Also, I recall very well that, during the election campaign, the Prime Minister promised to appoint only elected members to the cabinet. With that Senate appointment, he broke the promise he had made to voters during the campaign. During the next election, voters will be able to judge for themselves how well the Conservatives can keep their promises.

One more factor is very worrisome. Voters will not be represented equally in the Senate. For instance, in the case of Prince Edward Island, one senator will represent some 27,000 voters, while in other areas of Canada—particularly in Quebec—that proportion will be much higher.

There will be virtually no way to remove senators.

The bill provides for the consultation of the population for the appointment of senators, although it is not binding, as we have just seen. They will be appointed for one term. I realize that some say that the bill provides for a maximum term of eight years for senators, which could solve the problem. But it seems to me that presenting oneself to the electorate only once in eight years is far from a guarantee that these so-called “elected” senators will reflect the concerns of citizens of Quebec or Canada.

In addition, the Senate is an institution that was created a very long time ago, and I find it ridiculous that certain restrictions on presenting oneself as a candidate for the position of senator have been retained. At present, you must be at least 30 years old and own real property worth at least $4,000 in the province and the riding that the individual is appointed to represent. Hence, all those under 30 are excluded. I find that very discriminatory. The rule about assets penalizes a part of our population that might seek to be candidates for such elections. This additional factor demonstrates that the proposal before us does not address the root cause of the problem and that it even seeks to rehabilitate an institution that has lost credibility in the eyes of a good number of Canadians and Quebeckers.

Indirectly, the elected Senate would even undermine the parliamentary system. I will come back to that. As you know, in the British parliamentary system, the executive defends the confidence conferred on it by the House of Commons, which is also elected. Thus, the election of the Senate alone would undermine the preeminence of the House of Commons and would create confusion. The election of two Houses would complicate the issue of preponderance and consequently would weaken the parliamentary system.

The Bloc thinks that this is an ill-conceived and irrelevant bill. Moreover, there is no set spending limit for the candidates. The government says that the individual contribution limits and the transfer limits imposed on parties will be sufficient to limit spending. However, since there is an unlimited number of potential candidates and election spending is subject to partial reimbursement out of public funds, it seems unreasonable not to limit individual spending. Lastly, some seats could be vacant for four years, unless there is a reserve. If a senator left their seat for health reasons, if they died or left for some other reason, we would have to wait four years for a new senator. As I said, unless a reserve is created, the bill is ill-conceived from this perspective.

For all these reasons, we would have preferred debating another subject today. As I said earlier, I feel as though I am at the tooth puller instead of being at the dentist. I do not want to alienate my dentist or dentists in general. It is good to go to the dentist, it is even recommended. But it is not recommended to go to a tooth puller.

I think we should be addressing real problems and real issues, such as the fiscal imbalance. In the budget—we continue to support Bill C-52, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 19, 2007—there is a partial financial correction to the fiscal imbalance, but the crux of it is not corrected. The federal government has too much revenue in relation to its responsibilities. Its transfers related to matters under provincial jurisdiction continue to keep Quebec and the other provinces at the mercy of unilateral decisions made here in Ottawa, even though those jurisdictions belong to the provinces. The Bloc feels that the tax base corresponding to the transfers for health, social programs and post-secondary education should, quite simply, be transferred to the provinces as tax points, whether through the GST or income tax.

Still with the fiscal imbalance, the ability to control or even limit the federal government's spending power should be a priority. The Minister of Finance and the Prime Minister have repeatedly promised legislation to limit federal spending power. We are still waiting for this legislation. Such legislation would allow a province, such as Quebec for example, to withdraw from a program implemented, in a shared or unilateral manner, by the federal government in the jurisdictions of the provinces and Quebec. Quebec could opt out with full compensation and without condition. This is important for the people of Quebec and people who need a good health care system, a good education system and social programs that provide an adequate social safety net. For those people, the Senate is of little or no concern in their daily lives.

I would now like to talk about the environment. It seems to me that, ever since the plan was introduced by the Minister of the Environment, criticism has not stopped flooding in from all sides, including from scientists, environmentalists and industrialists alike. We just learned this morning about a poll conducted in Alberta that reveals that 92% of Albertans believe that the oil companies should make a greater effort to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Even more interesting, 70%—I am not sure about this percentage—of Albertans said that these reductions should be in absolute targets, and not intensity targets. What people want in the next few years is a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions compared to what we have seen in recent years. They do not want to see merely a slower increase, which would still mean more in the end, even if we produce less per tonne. It is not only Quebeckers and the general population of Canada that are concerned about this. These are also the concerns of Albertans, who, as we all know, are closely tied to the oil and gas industry.

I would like to talk about foreign policy. This should have been a concern. We do not have a foreign policy statement. The Liberal government, before the election that brought its defeat, had introduced a foreign policy statement dealing with defence and international trade.

No one seems to know where we are headed with this, but we are still spending. The government has just announced the purchase of more tanks, but they were purchased on the sly. International cooperation, however, has not seen much development.

Lastly, employment insurance, assistance programs for festivals and exhibitions, the Saint-Hubert airport, these all deserved greater attention, but that attention has been diverted to Bill C-43.

[Privilege, April 26th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, in brief, I wish to join this debate to support the member for Mississauga South. The Bloc Québécois also has the impression that parliamentary privilege has been breached by the attitude of the Minister of National Defence, who could not have been in the dark about what was happening in Afghan prisons. A report prepared by senior officials at Foreign Affairs and International Trade has been available since 2006. Therefore, it is a question either of incompetence—and in my opinion, of breach of parliamentary privilege—or of hiding the truth. The latter seems more plausible to me.

This morning in Le Devoir, a journalist spoke of the collective duplicity of the government. For example, after the Bloc Québécois asked 40 questions on what happened to Afghan detainees, we were given the impossible answer that it was all rumours and allegations, even though this report actually does exist.

The proof that the government and the Minister of National Defence acknowledge that we were right to ask these questions is that we were told yesterday that a verbal agreement with the Afghan authorities on the treatment of Afghan detainees was made between 3 and 4 o'clock.

Therefore I am also joining the debate and saying that the Minister of National Defence breached parliamentary privilege and therefore I am asking the Speaker to call him to order.