:
I will call the meeting to order. We have quorum.
Welcome to meeting number 24 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance.
Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the committee's motion adopted on Thursday, November 19, 2020, the committee is meeting to study government spending, WE Charity and the Canada student service grant.
Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the House order of January 25, 2021; therefore, members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application.
Proceedings will be made available via the House of Commons website, and the webcast will always show the person speaking rather than the entirety of the committee.
Before I welcome our witnesses, we have two quick pieces of business. One is a request for a project budget for Bill , an act to amend the Income Tax Act (transfer of small business or family farm or fishing corporation). That request is in the amount of $1,275, and I believe people received a copy of that.
It is moved by Mr. Falk.
(Motion agreed to)
The Chair: The second is a request for a project budget relating to the COVID-19 spending and programs, and the amount requested for that study at the moment is $3,025. Do I have any movers on that one?
That is moved by Ms. Koutrakis.
(Motion agreed to)
The Chair: Mr. Clerk, there is authorization for those two budgets.
With that, I see Mr. Fraser is here.
Do you want to do the sound check? Then we'll go to Mr. Dufresne.
With that, as I said earlier, we are meeting on the WE issue and the study related to that, and we've invited the law clerk and parliamentary counsel to come before committee.
I'd like to welcome our witnesses now. We have Philippe Dufresne, law clerk and parliamentary counsel; and Marie-Sophie Gauthier, legal counsel, Office of the Law Clerk and Parliamentary Counsel. Welcome to you both.
I believe, Mr. Dufresne, you have opening remarks. The floor is yours. Welcome.
I hope everyone can hear me well.
[Translation]
Thank you, Mr. Chair, members of the committee, for your invitation to appear today following the motions that were adopted by this committee on July 7 and November 19, 2020, respectively, ordering the production of documents related to the WE Charity and the social enterprise “Me to We”.
As the Law Clerk and Parliamentary Counsel for the House of Commons, I am pleased to be here today to address any questions that the committee may have with respect to these motions. I hope that my answers will assist the committee in its study.
[English]
Before turning to the committee's motions, I want to take a few moments to highlight the committee’s powers to send for documents. The House has certain powers that are essential to its work and part of its collective privileges. As the “grand inquest of the nation”, the House has the right to institute and conduct inquiries. This right is part of the House’s privileges, immunities and powers, which are rooted in the preamble and section 18 of the Constitution Act, 1867, and section 4 of the Parliament of Canada Act. Indeed, these rights and this fundamental role have been recognized by courts and include the constitutional power to send for persons, documents and records.
As Speaker Milliken stated in his landmark ruling of April 27, 2010, regarding the production of documents to the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan, the rights to order the production of documents are “fundamental to [Parliament’s] proper functioning” and are “as old as Parliament itself”.
Speaker Milliken went on to say the following:
The Standing Orders do not delimit the power to order the production of papers and records. The result is a broad, absolute power that on the surface appears to be without restriction. There is no limit on the type of papers likely to be requested, the only prerequisite is that the papers exist—in hard copy or electronic format—and that they are located in Canada....
No statute or practice diminishes the fullness of the power rooted in the House privileges unless there is an explicit legal provision to that effect, or unless the House adopts a specific resolution limiting the power. The House has never set a limit on its power to order the production of papers and records.
[Translation]
Parliament has the right to send for any and all documents that it believes are necessary for its information. The only limitations are that the document or record must exist, and it must be located in Canada.
The House and its committees’ powers to order the production of records constitute a constitutional parliamentary privilege that supersedes statutory law, which is why committees are not constrained by the statutory obligations contained in legislation like the Access to Information Act or the Privacy Act.
When committees ask for documents, they are entitled to receive them, subject only to the exceptions or limitations to disclosure explicitly provided for by the committee itself.
With that said, in exercising this power, I always recommend that committees should strive to balance their roles as the “grand inquest of the nation” against the legitimate public policy considerations that may justify limiting the disclosure of the requested information in a public setting—be it Cabinet confidence, national security or other claims of confidentiality.
[English]
When faced with a confidentiality claim, a committee has a number of options. It can decide not to insist on the production of the documents. It can decide to put in measures that would safeguard the confidential nature of certain information, or it can simply maintain its original request for the information.
Some of the measures that a committee could take to ensure that information is kept confidential while it is being consulted include reviewing the information in camera, having my office review and/or redact documents, as appropriate, to ensure that a claim for—
Some of these options include having my office review and/or redact documents, as appropriate, to ensure that a claim for confidentiality is justified; asking the party providing the documents to redact certain types of information; requesting limited and numbered paper copies; or arranging for the disposal or destruction of copies after the committee meeting.
It is for the House and its committees to make this determination and to set the parameters on the disclosure of documents being produced. If a committee's order is not complied with, the committee may report the refusal to the House. Ultimately, the House has the final say and may order the production of any documents or impose sanctions.
In this instance, the committee adopted a motion on July 7, 2020, ordering that the government produce documents related to WE Charity and Me to We. The motion expressly provided that matters of cabinet confidence and national security be excluded from the request. It also required that any redactions necessary—including to protect the privacy of Canadian citizens and permanent residents whose names and personal information may be included in the documents, as well as public servants who have been providing assistance on this matter—be made by my office.
[Translation]
The government provided the requested documents to the committee, and they were in turn given to my office so that we could make the necessary redactions. After reviewing and redacting the documents in accordance with this committee’s order, I reported to the committee by way of letter on August 18, 2020.
In my report, I noted that the documents produced by the government had already been redacted and that certain grounds were not contemplated by the committee’s order. My office had not been given the opportunity to see the unredacted documents and could therefore not confirm whether those redactions were consistent with the committee’s order.
I concluded that, in the circumstances, it was for this committee to determine whether it was satisfied with the documents as redacted by the departments. As I stated previously, when faced with a claim of confidentiality, it is up to the committee to determine whether to accept the ground that is being put forward.
[English]
On November 19, 2020, this committee adopted another motion, which ordered that the government provide to me “all documents as originally requested” in the July 7 motion, “including all documents the government provided...in August, without any redaction, omission or exclusion except as was justified originally in sections and subsections 69(1) through 69(3)(b)(ii) of the Access to Information Act”—namely, cabinet confidences. The motion also provided that I would use the information to “determine the government's compliance or non-compliance” with the July 7 motion.
On November 24, 2020, my office received the documents from the government that were provided in response to the July 7 motion, but this time without redactions, omissions or exclusions except for matters of cabinet confidence or lack of relevance. On December 14 the government provided my office with pages that were missing from the French package.
The documents provided in response to this committee's motions of July 7 and November 19 contained redactions for matters of cabinet confidences. I do not take issue with these redactions, as cabinet confidences were expressly excluded from both motions.
Based on our review of the documents provided to my office in November and December of 2020, I can confirm that some of the government's redactions are based on grounds that were not contemplated by the committee's order of July 7 but that are, rather, rooted in the Access to Information Act. Specifically, those grounds are as follows: personal information, namely that while the July 7 motion contemplated that personal information would be redacted, the committee entrusted these redactions to my office and not the government; third party information; information on the vulnerability of the government's computer or communication systems or methods employed to protect those systems; solicitor-client privilege; and to protect accounts of consultations or deliberations in which directors, officers or employees of a government institution, a minister of the Crown, or the staff of a minister participated.
[Translation]
I can confirm that these redactions relate to information that would be exempt from disclosure under the Access to Information Act. However, as mentioned in my report to this committee of last August, the House and its committees are not subject to these statutory restrictions.
Should this committee agree to allow the redaction of documents on the grounds I’ve just mentioned, I can confirm that the manner in which the grounds were interpreted by the government would be appropriate.
Ultimately, it is up to this committee to determine whether it is satisfied with the documents provided in response to its order.
With that, I would be pleased to answer any questions.
:
Right. We don't know one way or the other whether or not those exclusions are properly applied.
On a related matter, Mr. Dufresne, you are the chief legal counsel to Parliament. You know its powers better than anyone. Today your office sent me a briefing note, telling me that the power of Parliament to send for persons is part of the privileges, rights and immunities of the House of Commons, which were inherited when it was created and are found in section 18 of the Constitution Act of 1867 and section 4 of the Parliament of Canada Act.
Now that in the related committee, the ethics committee, the Kielburger brothers have refused to appear—have refused an invitation from Parliament—can Parliament issue a summons and force them to appear before that committee? If they still refuse—
:
I point this out because you said in your remarks—I wrote it down here, so I'll just read it for the record—that “some of the government's redactions” are based on grounds not contemplated by the July 7 motion. That's the part that Mr. Poilievre heard. I acknowledge that he heard this part. However, it seems he did not hear the rest, where you said that they “are, rather, rooted in the Access to Information Act”.
You mentioned solicitor-client privilege. You affirmed the importance of solicitor-client privilege to our legal system in Canada. There are other examples that you give, including personal information.
I put it to my colleagues on the committee that it's very important that the personal information of public servants and other third parties be protected, unless Mr. Poilievre wants the cellphone numbers or email addresses of certain public servants so he can call or email them. I'm sure he's up to it. I'm sure he would do that, but I don't think that's really important. I think that information is protected—I know it is—under the Access to Information Act, which is a critical thing.
Would you, Mr. Dufresne, have made the same redactions if it had been up to you?
I want to read something, Mr. Chair, if I could. Let me just bring it up here. I have in front of me an October 19 press release issued by members of the Conservative party, which reads, “There is clearly information related to this”—they term it a scandal—“that the government blacked out and don't want Canadians to see.”
Again, and forgive me if it's a repetitive point, but I think Canadians deserve the assurance. Is there any evidence that important documents relating to this contract were redacted?
Mr. Chair, what we have heard here is clear, in my view. You will recall that in the many meetings we had over the course of a number of months on this issue, I did not and my Liberal colleagues did not stand in the way of our discussing the WE Charity issue.
We've had it confirmed now that redactions made on political grounds did not take place. Where those redactions took place, it was entirely consistent with Canadian law—again, things like solicitor-client privilege and things like the protection of personal information.
I would ask my colleagues on the committee whether, if they had family members or friends who were public servants, for example, they would want the personal cellphone numbers or email addresses of those individuals shared. We know the answer, and we have law in place to protect that personal information.
Mr. Poilievre will wave papers, as he did in that infamous press conference, and I underline the word infamous in particular, Mr. Chair. He will wave papers around that look to be redacted to create another story, but there's no story here. I don't see anything nefarious that took place. I'm satisfied that the government acted in an appropriate way.
Thank you very much.
:
Thanks very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Dufresne and Madame Gauthier, for your presence here today and your work on behalf of elected officials. We hope that you and your families continue to stay safe during this pandemic.
Mr. Dufresne, I want to come back to your initial points around the editing or censoring of the documents going beyond the committee order. You referenced the Access to Information Act. Of course, the Access to Information Act is highly criticized. In many respects, it's a “hiding” access to information act, because of the grounds for exclusion.
I'm very interested in knowing to what degree the government went beyond the committee's order of July 7. It's now obvious that it did, and fortunately your examination has indicated that. I would like to know how many pages were redacted or blacked out under the grounds—which are wide, in access to information—of personal information or third party information. How many of the pages were blacked out because of that?
:
We're talking about a few hundred pages, just the same.
I know you can't comment—you have to comment on the law as it is—but our Access to Information Act is highly criticized because of the vast exemptions you can drive a truck through. It's a matter of frustration for many parliamentarians. Thank you for that.
I'll move now to the issue of respecting a committee summons and the Kielburger brothers. Recent very serious allegations have come out—despite the abrupt prorogation in August and the months of chaos we had in this committee due to Liberal filibusters—of abuse of charitable contributions and abuse of charitable funds. Of course, it's important that committees get to the bottom of that.
You indicated that a committee that issues a summons that is ignored can report the matter to the House. The House can then deliberate and make a finding of contempt of Parliament. You cited the case of 1913. For those who are tuning in, particularly from the parliamentary press gallery, perhaps it would be germane if you could reference that last case where there was a finding of contempt of Parliament and what the results were.
:
Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Dufresne, for being here with us today.
I'll start off with a question beginning where Mr. Poilievre ended. If portions of documents that were not relevant had been left in, and if, in fact, the government had provided you with all of the pages of the irrelevant documents in its possession, do you believe it would have helped or hindered your work?
:
Also, if we had not given it, then no one would ever have noticed whether it existed or not.
I want to go back a little. We started with the July 7 motion, which requested a certain number of documents. Then you indicated to us that our civil servants decided that they were going to additionally exclude certain bits of information as per the Access to Information Act, and you listed those very well in your comments, noting that they are the personal information, the third party, the solicitor-client privilege grounds, etc.
I want to be clear. Have you seen any evidence that there was any political interference in applying the Access to Information Act, or was this done just by the civil servants?
I just heard my colleague from Davenport say that, if a document had not been provided to the committee, the committee would never have noticed that it did not have that document or that information. She was talking about the relevance of the documents. I hope that the government did not act on that basis. Of course, I want to repeat that I believe it is up to the committee to decide whether documents are relevant.
Mr. Dufresne, a little earlier, I asked you whether, to your knowledge and in your experience, this type of redaction by officials is a usual practice. I would like to go into that issue a little more.
Mr. Shugart, whom you know, told this committee that he had “started the ball rolling in the system, and if people had questions, doubts, trouble interpreting the instructions—”
My colleague from Davenport just said that, if documents hadn't been provided, no one would have noticed. She just told us this. I hope that this wasn't the government's intention when it decided that officials would redact the documents. Personally, I'm concerned about this. I believe that the responsibility for determining the relevance of the documents lies with the committee or with the law clerk and parliamentary counsel, and not with outsiders.
That's why, Mr. Dufresne, I'd like to expand on my last question about whether, based on your knowledge and experience, this type of redaction is common practice.
I'll quote Mr. Shugart, whom you know. He said the following in the committee: “... I started the ball rolling in the system, and if people had questions, doubts, trouble interpreting the instructions, the departments could ask the Privy Council Office for a judgment call. In that sense, yes, and ultimately, I am responsible.”
I'm wondering whether you find it odd that the most senior official in the 's department asked the different departments to redact the documents. Is that a common practice?
:
Thanks very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Dufresne. This is very illuminating.
So far we found that the documents were wholly or partially redacted—at least 300 pages—using the broad loopholes of the Access to Information Act. I find that quite disturbing.
I'd like to come back to the other element of your testimony that I find quite disturbing. That is that other redactions, omissions, and exclusions took place on the grounds of cabinet confidence and on the grounds of relevance.
The original motion, as you indicated, also talked about national security. I'm presuming that national security was not cited as a reason for any of the substantial redactions that took place. My question is, how many pages were wholly or partially redacted on the grounds of matters of cabinet confidence, and how many pages were excluded, wholly or partially, on the grounds of relevance?
Madame Gauthier, if you have something to add, please don't hesitate.
We're now up to at least 600 pages. What I found disturbing, when the original documents were dumped as Parliament was stripped of its powers by prorogation, was the sheer size and scope of the blacking out of documents. It was stunning to me, as a member of the committee, to see to what extent the government was ripping apart what had been a very clear indication of the importance of obtaining those documents.
If we're now looking at 600 pages plus whatever was redacted out on the basis of relevance, I would be interested, Mr. Dufresne, in having you talk about what the committee's options are going forward. We have what is still a substantial redaction of the original request. What options do we have, as committee members, to get to the bottom of this scandal?
:
Exactly. We specifically asked for that documentation to be given to you unredacted, so that you, a trusted lawyer of the House of Commons and Parliament, could determine what was and was not relevant and tell us whether the government was redacting the information because it was truly irrelevant or whether it was just covering up what it didn't want Canadians to see. Now we've learned that it covered it up, even from you, and asked you to trust that everything contained under this black ink was irrelevant and that you didn't need to see it.
That is exactly the opposite of what we asked the government to do and what the members on this committee agreed to do. Shame on all the Liberal members of this committee who specifically committed to this. Mr. Fraser specifically committed to me that the disclosure from the government would include, unredacted, the information it had previously claimed was irrelevant. That is not what happened, so the government members did not keep their word. Shame on them for deceiving Canadians and fellow parliamentarians.
Let me move on now to the subject of bringing in witnesses who refuse to co-operate.
To me your report says that the House of Commons possesses the right to confine individuals as a punishment for contempt. You go on to say that the House ordered the Sergeant-at-Arms to take individuals into custody on four occasions and ordered the imprisonment of others, so could the House of Commons have law enforcement authorities take the Kielburgers into custody and compel them to testify, if it so wished and if they refused? Is that an accurate reading of the report you gave me?
:
Let me say I hope it never has to be done again. I hope the Kielburgers look at the powers Parliament has, these ancient authorities that we inherited from our British ancestors, and agree to appear and answer the questions of parliamentarians honestly. I just wanted to confirm that, indeed, this power does exist, and if the Kielburgers refuse, then we can exercise these powers, and I have no doubt that Parliament would do exactly that.
We have learned today, as per your confirmation, that the committee's unmitigated powers to request and receive information have not been fully honoured; that the government is now blacking out information that it promised to release, on the grounds that it interprets that information as irrelevant; that you have no way of confirming whether the information is irrelevant, because they won't let even you see it; and that effectively there are hundreds of pages that continue to be covered up. We don't know what's behind them. We don't know if the cover-up is justified under the law. Now we, as parliamentarians, have to decide what to do.
To conclude, Mr. Dufresne, can you confirm that as parliamentarians we have the right to call any and all documents without restriction and without limitation?
:
Right, so Mr. Fraser's whole line of questioning comes crashing down like a house of cards. He was claiming that somehow the “irrelevant” exclusion was contained in the original motion. It was not, as you've just confirmed, and it was not included in the second motion. Therefore, the government was in no way empowered to black out things it considered to be irrelevant.
There could be all kinds of evidence of corruption related to this scandal that the government considers irrelevant to the public. I mean, let's remember that this is a scandal about the personally intervening to award half a billion dollars to a group that gave his family half a million dollars. It's the kind of corruption that puts politicians behind bars in other countries, but it's the kind of corruption that is apparently accepted in this government, and now we expect the same government that engages in these practices to have the authority to black out information that it doesn't consider relevant to the public. That is not what this committee requested.
Mr. Fraser personally committed to me and to this committee that the only information that would be excluded in the disclosure to you would be on the grounds of cabinet confidence. That is a commitment that he and the government have violated. That will have to be taken into consideration the next time we agree to a compromise with him and with the members of the government. I'm very disappointed to learn that they did not honour the commitment we agreed to when we passed the second motion in November.
Mr. Clerk, in going back to our original discussion about witness appearances, I'm going to again read from the report you gave me:
In order to facilitate the witness's attendance, the Committee presented a report to the House requesting that the Speaker issue a warrant for his appearance. The House subsequently concurred in the report.
In other words, a committee can pass a motion seeking a warrant to physically compel witnesses to appear. If the House then concurs in the issuance of that warrant, the Speaker would then seek law enforcement to carry it out. Is that your understanding, Mr. Dufresne?
Thank you, Mr. Dufresne, for your testimony before the finance committee this afternoon.
I'd like to add my comments to Mr. Poilievre's comments calling into question my participation here as a Liberal member of the finance committee. As everybody knows, I'm a relatively new MP. It's my first mandate, but I can tell you that nobody has ever questioned my integrity or whether I, as a Liberal member or otherwise, have negotiated in good faith. I don't appreciate, and I want this on the record, comments shaming me and my Liberal caucus members on this committee, because I know that everybody on this committee, regardless of party, works in good faith. I'd like to believe that we are given the same courtesy.
Mr. Dufresne, how important is it for a government to review information that is considered cabinet confidence or irrelevant to the issue at hand, without sharing this information with the office of the law clerk? Why are these safeguards in place?
:
I think the Clerk of the Privy Council testified to that more eloquently than I could, in terms of why the government acts and feels the way it does. What I can say is that the government has, the public service and the clerks of the Privy Council, consistently defended cabinet confidences, irrespective of political party and power. We have a neutral, non-partisan public service in this country. They serve the interests of the executive branch in a non-partisan, impartial way, as my office serves the interests of the legislative branch.
In terms of cabinet confidence, as I said, the testimony from the clerk was eloquent and talked about the necessity for ministers to be able to speak frankly and to have discussions in cabinet. Once the decision is made, cabinet solidarity requires all to defend the decision, and that needs to be protected. That's the basis for the government's....
The court quite rightly noted that cabinet confidences have been recognized by the Supreme Court of Canada, so it is not something to be taken lightly. My point here today is that, in my view, the House, as the grand inquest of the nation, does have the power to request all information but should give weight, and perhaps significant weight, to some of those public policy considerations.
I would have liked to respond to my colleague from Vimy with regard to the best way to do things. Here, it's all about trust. It's a matter of trusting the committee, but also trusting the elected officials, by extension, who represent Quebeckers and Canadians. We can see that it has become a standard practice for officials to make redactions. Instead, we should trust our elected officials. We should have confidence in their ability to protect confidential information.
In his remarks, Mr. Dufresne outlined five ways for the committee to protect confidential information. Why not use these options? I don't have all the figures. However, we heard that about 15% of the documents were redacted. I'm concerned about this. I think that the committee orders documents to be produced, not the Prime Minister or his office. As I just said, there are ways for the committee to protect confidential information.
Mr. Dufresne, we heard about 5,000 pages of documents related to the WE scandal. Of course, the committee didn't ask for all these documents to be produced. However, if it had done so and had analyzed all the documents in camera, to ensure confidentiality, of course, do you think that it would have found additional relevant information? Again, the committee must determine whether the information is relevant to its study.
:
Thank you, Mr. Dufresne. I greatly appreciate it.
Honestly, I must say that I'm very frustrated, as a member of the House of Commons and a member of this committee. After the start of the pandemic, we were given the task of reviewing all government spending and ensuring that the spending was done properly. When spending was questionable, we were responsible for following up. We tried to do so this summer. The 's Office then suspended Parliament, instead of letting the Standing Committee on Finance ask questions. Now we're learning more about the number of redacted or censored documents. We're talking about over 600 pages.
Rather than ask Mr. Dufresne a question, I want to make a comment. The committee must get to the bottom of things, have access to unredacted documents and release to the public whatever needs to be publicly available. The House of Commons gave this responsibility to the Standing Committee on Finance at the start of the crisis.
To sum up the situation, we're talking about a scandal where the stepped in to award a half-billion dollar contract to a group that had paid his family half a million dollars. Our committee asked for all the documents related to this situation, but the government redacted hundreds of pages. After a long period of filibustering, the government said that it wanted to provide all the documents, except the documents protected by cabinet confidence. Now we're learning that, contrary to their commitment, the Liberals again redacted documents on the basis that the documents weren't relevant.
Mr. Dufresne, you confirmed three things today. First, the government didn't honour the committee's motion to release all the documents without redactions. Second, some documents are still redacted on the basis that they aren't relevant. Third, you have no way of knowing whether the documents redacted on the basis of cabinet confidence were actually redacted for this reason.
Would you like to add anything to my comments?
Mr. Dufresne, I just had a note come through that Mr. Poilievre tweeted out not long ago that, during this meeting, you revealed that the government did not reveal all the documents the finance committee ordered released in the summer, and that the government is blacking out information it claims is not relevant. From your testimony, I don't think that's a fair description.
I think what you actually said is that the non-partisan public service has redacted information that was not relevant because this committee didn't ask for it in the first place. Is that a better characterization of your testimony?
:
Thank you. I think it's very clear that your concern is not related to the batch of documents marked “not relevant” but to other documents.
On the issue of relevance, Mr. Poilievre made the point earlier in this meeting that there was no explicit power to exclude the documents based on relevance, but of course, if documents are not asked for they need not be produced.
I'm curious whether you would agree with me that documents that may pertain to, say, vaccine procurement or domestic production of PPE, and that may have been redacted, are similar in kind, in your view, to the other documents that would be within the custody of the Government of Canada on other issues that did not pertain to the motion.
To wrap up, I'll give a summary of some of the things I've heard you say. At the end, Mr. Dufresne, could you confirm whether my assessment of your testimony is accurate?
You've said that the government made redactions pursuant to cabinet confidences and pursuant to relevancy, and was entitled to do so. So far as you can tell, those were made by the independent public service. You also indicated that, although you have some concerns about the access to information grounds, if the legislative standard was actually the one that was properly applied, it was done consistent with those legislative standards.
Is all of that accurate in your view?
:
Mr. Chair, to confirm what we said all along, Conservatives were never looking for every irrelevant document to be included. We were looking for documents that the government covered up with black ink on the grounds that—as it claimed—they were irrelevant to be reviewed by the clerk.
The reason for that is to ascertain if, in fact, the information contained under that ink was irrelevant, which is something the clerk cannot confirm because he has not seen them. If it were completely unrelated, then it would not have been included in the disclosure in the first place. Obviously, information not relevant would not have been included because, as Mr. Fraser correctly points out, that would have been literally millions or even billions of pages.
We're talking about information that was included but blacked out. If the government has nothing to hide—if, in fact, this is just unrelated information about PPE procurement, as Mr. Fraser claims—it would have let the clerk look at it and confirm as much. He could, in a confidential way, have determined the relevance.
I ask again, Mr. Dufresne, did you have the ability to look at information marked “not relevant” to confirm whether in fact it was or was not relevant?
Again, Mr. Fraser expects us just to take the government's word that nothing behind the black ink was relevant to Canadians.
Furthermore, the government is saying that there is no precedent for cabinet confidences to be reviewed by parliamentary committees in manners that are protected from public disclosure. Can you confirm whether, in the Afghan detainee controversy, a parliamentary committee was able to look at those sorts of things, in private, without public disclosure?
:
Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.
There might be time for one minute, if one of my colleagues has another question.
I want to correct the record, because I think that is important to do in these cases. My colleague Mr. Poilievre made a statement that was not true when he indicated that the intervened to give WE Charity the half-million dollar contract. That has proven to be completely untrue, according to all of the evidence that we heard throughout the summer. I think we need to make sure this is on the record in this meeting.
I also want to address what Mr. Poilievre just said about their having to take the government's word that the documents were not relevant. I want to remind everyone that when we're saying “the government”, these are non-partisan civil servants who are responsible for ensuring that they follow the committee's instructions and provide the documents as instructed.
My question to you, Mr. Dufresne, because I want to make sure this is crystal clear in the minds and understanding of anyone who is actually listening to us, is this: Have you seen or has there been any evidence of, in your view, any political interference in the work that our civil servants have done to provide us with that information?