Fragment from Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development Meeting of May 10, 2007

 
Mrs. Vivian Barbot (Papineau, BQ): 
    Do we have a report on that; on human rights in China?
[English]
  
The Chair:  
    Yes.
[Translation]
  
Mrs. Vivian Barbot: 
    I've never seen it. 
[English]
  
Mr. Deepak Obhrai: 
    Now we can have coffee.
  
The Chair: 
    No, we can't have coffee.
    This is the part of committee  business, unfortunately, that a chair does not like doing, but again, here is the problem: We have postponed a committee report on China to the 31st, and now it has been leaked, or parts of it have been leaked. It's quoted in The Globe and Mail today. They quote one member from the subcommittee. 
    Again, as I look around this table, most of you have a great deal of parliamentary experience, and you know that when reporters phone you on a report that has not been tabled we have no comment. We don't talk about the recommendations. We don't talk about the direction in which this report is going. We don't talk about what the government's response may be to this report. We don't talk about anything, because it's still not public. 
    Perhaps I'm not speaking to the group that I should be. Maybe I should be speaking to the subcommittee. But it is not  right; it is not ethically right to start leaking these reports. I know people love to talk to reporters and they like to see their name in the paper, but in all fairness, until every individual of the committee has the opportunity to respond to this report, I would ask that you not speak to reporters. All right? So that's on the record.
    Mr. Wilfert, then Mr. Goldring.
   (0955)  
  
Hon. Bryon Wilfert (Richmond Hill, Lib.): 
    I would concur, Mr. Chairman, that it's an embargoed report, it's confidential, and there should be no discussion whatsoever. Beyond that, I think we need to be very clear that, at any time, this obviously causes problems for all of us. It has already caused problems, because certain people now want to know more since it's out there.
  
The Chair: 
    Yes.
    Mr. Goldring, and then we will go to our second hour.
  
Mr. Peter Goldring (Edmonton East, CPC): 
    If it can be determined who.... The report really isn't that clear. It mentions one person, and if that one person wants to acknowledge it, that's fine, but the report also says "MPs", plural. If it was plural, then it was more than one. 
    At what point do you carry this forward? You have rules. You have breach of parliamentary privilege. You have things set in place. There's a reason to have the confidentiality, and this goes to the heart of the other reports we might be asking for, and information on prisoners and other things. If we intend to try to keep confidence in a committee and we don't have  the rules and we don't reinforce the rules, then we have nothing. 
    Is this something that should be brought up as a point of parliamentary privilege to determine?
  
The Chair: 
    That's a good question.
    I guess why I'm trying to chastise each one of us is so that, hopefully, each party will take the message back to their  people.
    We had a case in subcommittee of an in camera meeting where there was a press release given on the in camera meeting.
  
Mr. Peter Goldring: 
    Well, clearly, this one person mentioned should be questioned very directly--clearly. But the intimation of plural being more means that there should be more.
  
The Chair: 
    All right.
    Mr. Patry, a final word.
  
Mr. Bernard Patry: 
    I just want to go back to Mr. Goldring. 
    Mr. Goldring, when you talk about MPs, with an "s", it's the title, and a title is not the text from the person. This is what that person could have said: MPs. That's why they say MPs with an "s".
    Now, I've been on this committee for the past 14 years, and it has never occurred. All the members of this committee, the main committee of foreign affairs, are great about this. There was no leaking. I trust all my members. Nobody from our committee has done these things.
  
The Chair: 
    And that's why I said that hopefully we can take it back to other people.
    That report has been around for some time. It's been with our staffers. It's been with the subcommittee. Each one of us makes sure that we keep the integrity of this thing going.
    We will suspend for one minute, and then we will come back in camera.
    [Proceedings continue in camera]
 
http://cmte.parl.gc.ca/Content/HOC/committee/391/faae/evidence/ev2926063/faaeev55-e.htm#Int-2071517