Routine Proceedings / Tabling of Documents

Tabling of documents

Journals pp. 475-6

Debates p. 4971

Background

While the House sat in Committee of the Whole examining a clause of Bill C-207, the Government Organization Act, 1970, Mr. McGrath (St. John's East) made several references to a document released that day by a Minister outside the House. Rising immediately on a point of order, Mr. Baldwin (Peace River) suggested that the document be tabled and, in fact, that there was a mandatory requirement to do so when it had been cited in debate. Mr. McGrath supported this point and stated that the Prime Minister had suggested that he table the document. The Chairman (Mr. Honey) doubted any document could be tabled while the House was sitting in Committee of the Whole or that there was a procedure to allow it. The Chairman's ruling was appealed to the Speaker.

Issue

Is it possible for a Member to table a document?

Decision

A document can only be tabled by a Minister of the Crown, or by a Parliamentary Secretary acting on the Minister's behalf.

Reasons given by the Speaker

The Standing Orders are explicit on this issue: only Ministers of the Crown or Parliamentary Secretaries acting on their behalf are permitted to table documents. A Minister of the Crown is not allowed to quote or read from an official document in debate unless he is willing to table it. "This rule has never been otherwise interpreted by Speakers and has never been deemed by the House to be applicable to reference in debate to a document, official or otherwise, by a Member." The fact that a Member referred to an official document neither imposes an obligation to table it nor gives him or her the right to do so.

Sources cited

Standing Order 41(2).

Beauchesne, 4th ed., pp. 176-7, c. 209.

May, 17th ed., p. 458.

References

Debates, April 6, 1971, pp. 4967-71.