Parliamentary Privilege / Rights of the House

October 17, 2000

Debates, pp. 9172-4

At the beginning of the sitting on October 17, 2000, Peter MacKay (Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough) raised a question of privilege concerning the report of the Information Commissioner tabled in the House on October 16, 2000.^[1] Mr. MacKay argued that, in this report, the Information Commissioner complained about the actions of the Privy Council Office and the Treasury Board, contending that these departments had challenged his powers and denied him resources to carry out his duties. Mr. MacKay argued that this interference with an officer of Parliament constituted a contempt of the House. He asked the Speaker to rule it a prima facie matter of privilege so that a debate could take place on the issue immediately. On the same issue, Chuck Strahl (Fraser Valley) raised the question of the distribution of the report to opposition members after it was tabled in the House. After the intervention of other members , the Deputy Speaker (Peter Milliken) stated that with respect to the distribution of the documents, there was a miscommunication between the Information Commissioner’s Office and the Chair in respect of the time of the tabling. With regard to the question of privilege, he took the matter under advisement.^[2]

Later during the sitting, the Deputy Speaker delivered his ruling on the question of privilege. He stated that in his opinion the commissioner had not been impeded in carrying out his work and that the commissioner had various avenues of recourse available to him to raise his concerns and to defend them. In addition, the Deputy Speaker noted that the report had been referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, which could consider the concerns expressed by members with respect to these issues. He therefore could not find a prima facie case of contempt. Mr. Strahl then rose on a point of order to ask the Chair to explain what he meant when talking of miscommunication in the distribution of the report. The Deputy Speaker explained that copies were sent to the House Distribution Office with an embargo until the time of tabling, but it appeared that, when the document was tabled, the Distribution Office was not expecting to have to distribute the document at that time. However, he indicated that he had asked that the matter be investigated.

Decision of the Chair

The Deputy Speaker: The Chair is ready to give a decision on the question of privilege raised earlier today by the honourable member for Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough alleging interference with an officer of Parliament, namely the Information Commissioner.

As the honourable member for Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough noted, yesterday Mr. Speaker tabled the 1999-2000 Annual Report of the Information Commissioner. In his report the Information Commissioner complained about the actions of the federal government, and in particular the Privy Council Office and the Treasury Board Secretariat, contending that these departments had challenged his powers and denied him resources to carry out his duties.

The member for Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough argued that this interference constituted a contempt of the House and he called upon the Chair to rule it a prima facie case of privilege with the concomitant results.

I would first like to say that the Chair attaches considerable importance to the concerns expressed by the member. I also wish to thank the leader of the opposition in the House, the member for Fraser Valley, the leader of the Bloc québécois in the House, the member for Roberval, the leader of the government in the House, the House leader of the New Democratic Party, the Member for Winnipeg—Transcona, the member for Calgary—Nose Hill, and the member for Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Aldershot for their comments on this matter.

House of Commons Procedure and Practice makes it very clear at page 67:

—the House also claims the right to punish, as a contempt, any action which … tends to obstruct or impede the House in the performance of its functions; obstructs or impedes any member or officer of the House in the discharge of their duties; or is an offence against the authority or dignity of the House, such as disobedience of its legitimate commands or libels upon itself, its members or its officers.

The Chair must judge whether the complaints raised in the most unequivocal terms by the commissioner in his annual report constitute such an obstruction.

There can be little doubt that the Information Commissioner presents a colourful and impassioned case for the principle of access to information. He recalls that his very first annual report to Parliament set as his objective a policy of zero tolerance for government recalcitrance in complying with freedom of information legislation.

In this second report the commissioner notes that he has refused to retreat from this zero-tolerance policy and he rails at the resistance his office has continued to encounter in carrying out its work.

Despite his unforgiving assessment of the situation and his blunt annoyance, the commissioner concludes:

There is some heartening evidence that his game plan is working.

The Chair can well understand members’ reaction to the cri du coeur of the Information Commissioner, especially in the opening section of the report entitled “Access—A Right Under Siege” and the title “Mayday—Mayday”, but the very fact that the report is couched in such bold language and takes such a strong position is in my view evidence that the commissioner has not been impeded in carrying out his work.

He may be frustrated by the attitudes he has encountered in the senior echelons of government. He may even be outraged that the government does not take his mandate as seriously as he evidently does, but the fact that he voices those frustrations in no uncertain terms does not, in the view of the Chair, provide evidence of a prima facie case of contempt, especially when he is able to present his report unimpeded and obviously in his own words.

In addition, the annual report is permanently referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. When examining the report, this committee will be able to consider the concerns expressed by members with respect to these issues.

The committee can hear the Information Commissioner and his officials. It can call before it some of those mentioned in the report as less than fully cooperative and if as a result of this study the committee concludes from the evidence that the report does not merely document the frustrations of the commissioner but points to a climate of systematic obstruction, then the committee can report its findings to the House and ask the House to take appropriate action.

Rumours abound of a possible dissolution. However, the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights has this permanent reference and a new committee in a new Parliament may proceed, as the current one may do, and study this issue at its leisure.

Accordingly, in this particular case I find that there are various recourses immediately available to the Information Commissioner and to all honourable members. I therefore cannot find that a prima facie case of contempt has occurred.

I would like once again to thank the honourable member for Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough for drawing the commissioner’s views and his own concerns to the attention of the House. Like him, I look forward to the work of the Justice Committee on these important questions.

I also wish to tell the House that, with respect to the request by the honourable member for Roberval for an emergency debate this evening, the Chair has decided that such a request is not in order at this time. It does not meet the requirements of the Standing Orders.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I will take time to review your ruling in some detail when I see it in print.

The other point of order that I raised during that period was about the tabling of the report and when it was available to all parliamentarians. I believe you said it was a problem of miscommunication between the commissioner and the Speaker.

I wonder if you could explain that because I am not sure what miscommunication means. It was tabled in the House. It should be available to members. I do not know whom I should point the finger at. I am not pointing it at the government. I am wondering what went wrong there because that information, once tabled here, should be available immediately, as I understand it.

The Deputy Speaker: I do not want to tie the Chair down to an answer on this because I think we are looking into what exactly transpired, but the best information I can provide the honourable member with at this time is that the report was sent to the Speaker with the request that it be tabled at a particular time. The additional copies were sent to the Distribution Office with an embargo until another time later than the time requested for tabling.

It appears the document got tabled at a time when the Distribution Office was not expecting to distribute the document, so when members contacted the Office and asked for copies they were denied.

I have asked that this matter be investigated. I do not understand why there would have been two times, but I understand there were. I can report that far to the honourable member at this stage. I believe I am correct in what I have stated, without being more precise.

I know the honourable member would be happy to raise this matter with me in private. I would be more than happy to do whatever we can to see that this situation does not continue in the future.

It is an unsatisfactory way to proceed, in my view, and I sympathize with the position the honourable member was placed in, but I stress it was a matter of communication between the office of the Speaker, the table officers of the House and the Information Commissioner’s Office, and I believe two messages came from the latter.

P0106-e

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2000-10-17