Privilege / Miscellaneous

Miscellaneous; possession of documents

Debates pp. 4238-9

Background

During Oral Questions, Mr. Martin (Secretary of State for External Affairs) suggested in a reply to a question from Mr. Churchill (Winnipeg South Centre) that the latter was a "master of distortion and confusion". When cautioned by the Speaker, Mr. Martin added that he did not wish to impute motives; he should perhaps have used the word "forged" to describe a letter read by Mr. Churchill to the House. Mr. Churchill raised a question of privilege demanding that Mr. Martin withdraw his remarks, which referred to an incident one year ago in which Mr. Churchill had inadvertently read into the Debates a document that proved to be unauthentic. At that time the Speaker had ruled that Mr. Churchill was not guilty of forgery. After listening to Members' comments, the Speaker ruled on the question of privilege.

Issue

Does an allegation that a Member unknowingly possessed a forged document constitute grounds for a question of privilege?

Decision

No. It is not unparliamentary to suggest that a Member may have come into possession of forged documents.

Reasons given by the Speaker

"... it is not unparliamentary to suggest that a Member has had in his possession or has quoted a document which is not authentic if the Member did not know it was not authentic ... There is no question whatever that forged documents can come accidentally into the hands of any Member of the House. ''An apology and a retraction could, on the other hand, be demanded if a Member or a Minister accused another Member of having used forged documents knowingly.

References

Debates, November 14, 1967, pp. 4237-9.