Parliamentary Privilege / Rights of the House

Contempt of the House: Prime Minister alleged to have deliberately misled the House

October 30, 2013

Debates, pp. 595–7

On October 17, 2013, Charlie Angus (Timmins—James Bay) rose on a question of privilege to accuse Stephen Harper (Prime Minister) of providing misleading information to the House. He alleged that information revealed by an ongoing Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) investigation on the arrangement made regarding the payment of expenses between Senator Mike Duffy and Nigel Wright, the Prime Minister’s chief of staff, was in apparent contradiction with the Prime Minister’s statements in the House. Mr. Angus argued that this new information proved that either the staff of the Prime Minister withheld information from him or that he knowingly misled the House. Citing the three conditions that must be met to find that a Member deliberately misled the House, namely that it must be proven that the statement was misleading; that it must be established that the Member making the statement knew at the time that the statement was incorrect; and that in making the statement, the Member intended to mislead the House, he asserted that only one criterion was established for the moment, specifically that it was proven by court documents that statements made by the Prime Minister were misleading. Peter Van Loan (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons) stated that the Prime Minister answered questions based on the information he had at the time and that there was no intention to mislead the House. The Speaker also heard from other Members throughout the week of October 17 to 23, 2013, and took the matter under advisement.^[1]

Resolution

On October 30, 2013, the Speaker delivered his ruling. He stated that the accuracy or appropriateness of responses to questions in the House is not for the Speaker to judge but is rather a matter of debate, and he reminded the House of the time-honoured tradition of taking Members at their word. Considering the high threshold to prove that a Member misled the House, the Speaker concluded that there was no evidence that the Prime Minister’s statements were deliberately misleading, that he deliberately provided incorrect information, that he believed his statements to be misleading or that he intended them to be misleading. Accordingly, he ruled that there was no prima facie question of privilege.

Decision of the Chair

The Speaker: I am now prepared to rule on the question of privilege raised on October 17, 2013 by the hon. Member for Timmins—James Bay regarding alleged misleading statements made by the Prime Minister during Oral Questions on June 5, 2013.

I would like to thank the Member for Timmins—James Bay for raising this matter, as well as the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, the House Leader of the Official Opposition, the Member for Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, the Member for Winnipeg North, the Member for Richmond—Arthabaska and the Member for Avalon for their comments.

In raising this question of privilege, the Member for Timmins—James Bay claimed that answers given by the Prime Minister during Question Period on June 5 with respect to a financial transaction between his former chief of staff, Nigel Wright, and Senator Mike Duffy completely contradicted information later revealed in July through a Royal Canadian Mounted Police investigation.

The hon. Member focused on the Prime Minister’s June 5 assertion to this House that decisions regarding the transaction

....were not communicated to me or to members of my office.

He concluded that the discrepancy meant either that staff in the Prime Minister’s Office withheld information from him and knowingly allowed him to respond to questions in the House with false information, even perhaps without his knowledge, or that the Prime Minister chose to ignore the truth.

This, he said, was evidence enough for a finding by the Speaker that a prima facie breach of privilege had occurred. He likened the present situation to one faced by Speaker Jerome on December 6, 1978 after it had been ascertained that a former RCMP commissioner had deliberately misled a minister, who then provided the incorrect information to a Member, thus impeding him in the performance of his duties.

The Member for Timmins—James Bay then referred to my ruling of May 7, 2012, in which I reiterated the three conditions that need to be established when alleging that a Member is in contempt for deliberately misleading the House. In doing so, he acknowledged that only one of the three conditions had been met, namely that the statement in question was known to be misleading. He then stated that further study was required in order to determine whether the other two conditions had been met, namely whether the Prime Minister knew at the time that what he told the House was incorrect, and that in making the remarks the Prime Minister intended to mislead the House.

The Leader of the Government in the House of Commons countered that the Prime Minister had, in fact, indicated both inside and outside the House that he had answered questions based on the information he had at the time. The Government House Leader then recalled the long-standing practice in this House of accepting the word of a Member.

Furthermore, the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons argued that the ruling of Speaker Jerome, as cited by the Member for Timmins—James Bay was not instructive in the present case as that finding of prima facie privilege was firmly based on an admission by an official that he had deliberately misled a minister. He concluded that, since no answers provided in the House were known at the time to be incorrect, there was no intention on the part of the Prime Minister to mislead the House.

The importance of this issue for Members individually and collectively cannot be overstated, as it speaks to the very privileges upon which our parliamentary system is founded. Members frequently have risen in this House to defend their need, and indeed their right, to be provided with accurate and truthful information in order to fulfill their parliamentary obligations, and Speakers have frequently underscored the need for clarity and accuracy as well.

That said, many of my predecessors in the Chair have reminded the House that in most instances, claims related to disputed facts are not grounds for prima facie findings of privilege.

As Speaker Fraser indicated on December 4, 1986, at page 1792 of Debates:

Differences of opinion with respect to fact and details are not infrequent in the House and do not necessarily constitute a breach of privilege.

As stated in House of Commons Procedure and Practice, Second Edition, at page 510:

In most instances, when a point of order or a question of privilege has been raised in regard to a response to an oral question, the Speaker has ruled that the matter is a disagreement among Members over the facts surrounding the issue. As such, these matters are more a question of debate and do not constitute a breach of the rules or of privilege.

More recently, Speaker Milliken expanded on this and the role of the Chair in such instances when on January 31, 2008, at page 2435 of House of Commons Debates, he stated:

…any dispute regarding the accuracy or appropriateness of a minister’s response to an oral question is a matter of debate; it is not a matter for the Speaker to judge. The same holds true with respect to the breadth of a minister’s answer to a question in the House: this is not for the Speaker to determine.

While the Speaker might not be tasked with assessing the content of replies with respect [to their] accuracy or appropriateness, the Chair does, however, have an important if strictly limited role when it is alleged that the House has been misled. In this particular instance, the matter centres on allegations of the House being deliberately misled, so certain precedents and practices are germane to the case. As the Member for Timmins—James Bay and the Government House Leader have both indicated, my ruling of May 7, 2012, is of particular relevance. At that time, at page 7650 of the Debates, I stated:

It has become accepted practice in this House that the following elements have to be established when it is alleged that a Member is in contempt for deliberately misleading the House: one, it must be proven that the statement was misleading; two, it must be established that the Member making the statement knew at the time that the statement was incorrect; and three, that in making the statement, the Member intended to mislead the House.

Maingot’s second edition of Parliamentary Privilege in Canada, at page 234, lends further support to this assertion, indicating that:

…before the House will be permitted by the Speaker to embark on a debate in such circumstances [it must be demonstrated] that a Member of the House of Commons was intentionally misled or an admission of facts that leads naturally to the conclusion that a Member was intentionally misled, and a direct relationship between the misleading information and a proceeding in Parliament, is necessary.

Coupled with this is the time-honoured tradition of accepting a Member’s word in the House. Many of my predecessors have reiterated that principle over the years, just as Speaker Sauvé did on May 27, 1982, when she explained, at page 17823 of Debates, that:

I cannot attach greater credibility to the word of one hon. Member over another. The Speaker cannot interpret statements made by hon. Members which must be accepted at face value. The hon. Member [...] claims he had been misled. I accept that. He claims he has been deliberately misled. I accept that too, but as an assertion, not as a fact upon which I could find privilege; because the minister, who has the same right to have his word accepted in this House, says there is no attempt to mislead, deliberately or otherwise, and I accept that, too.

To uphold these conditions and practices, as the Chair must do, the threshold of proof is high. It should be no surprise then that in the rare instances when prima facie has been found, little or no doubt was left as to the validity of the claim made. The ruling of December 6, 1978, in which Speaker Jerome found that a prima facie contempt of the House existed, rested on the official’s own admission that the minister had been deliberately misled, and it was on that basis that Speaker Jerome stated in the [Debates] of December 6, 1978, at page 1857:

I can interpret that testimony in no other way than meaning that a deliberate attempt was made to obstruct the Member in the performance of his duties and, consequently, to obstruct the House itself.

This precedent stands in contrast to most others. Among them, and perhaps more analogous to the issue now before the House, is Speaker Milliken’s ruling of February 25, 2004, where he concluded at page 1047 of House of Commons Debates that there was no prima facie breach of privilege since:

...no evidence has been brought forth to show that…department officials deliberately intended to deceive their superiors and so obstruct hon. Members in the performance of their duties.

The Chair has carefully reviewed the evidence brought forward, as well as what was said in the House, searching for evidence that the conditions laid out in my ruling of May 2012, and in Speaker Milliken’s ruling of February 2011 that informed it, have been met. The Chair has not found that evidence. The Member for Timmins—James Bay himself doubted that all enumerated conditions for finding a prima facie privilege [had] materialized when he conceded:

The other two elements, however, do need to be clarified, and this is the reason I am asking you, Mr. Speaker, to find that there is a prima facie case so that the issue could be studied at greater depth by the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

He cast further doubt when he asked, “Did the Prime Minister know at the time that the statements he gave to the House were misleading?” and “Did the Prime Minister intend to mislead the House?”

By his own admission, neither question can be answered with certainty.

These same doubts were echoed by the House Leader of the Official Opposition and the Member for Winnipeg North. That the Prime Minister has acknowledged that he did not himself have full information when he provided an answer during Question Period last June 5 does not lead the Chair to conclude that the two missing conditions have been met. Nor is it appropriate for the Chair to speculate on whether the Prime Minister ought to have known of Mr. Wright’s actions or been told of them by the individuals in his office who are now said to have known about them.

The Chair understands that Members have strong views on both sides of this very public and evolving issue, but I must remind the House that the Chair is bound by very narrow parameters in situations such as this one.

Based on accepted practices, precedents and usages, as well as a thorough scouring of the evidence presented and statements made in the House, the Chair cannot, in the current circumstances, find evidence that the Prime Minister’s statements to the House were deliberately misleading, that he deliberately provided incorrect information, that he believed his statements to be misleading or that he intended them to be misleading.

Accordingly, the Chair can find no valid procedural grounds for finding a prima facie case of privilege at this time.

I thank honourable Members for their attention.