Madam Speaker, our founders would be horrified to learn of the motion we are debating today. That today in the House of Commons we would be debating and voting on a motion affirming our rights and privileges is disgraceful. Parliament's absolute power to require the government to produce uncensored documents when requested is fundamental to our democracy. Would we ever imagine a motion demanding that the government provide oxygen to this chamber? Of course not, yet documents, more specifically the information on them, is as critical to the functioning of this place as the air that we breathe.

That the government would deny the right to these things speaks to an administration that values secrecy, control, manipulation, and ultimately, a complete disregard for this House of Parliament.

I was elected not only to be the voice of the people from Mississauga—Streetsville, but to be their eyes and ears as well. They expect me to hold the government to account, to demand explanations for policy decisions, and to vote for or against those proposals. Without complete information, without clear and unbiased evidence, without a full cost analysis, how can I perform this honoured calling to the best of my abilities? The answer is I cannot.

That is why Parliament was vested with privileges. Our founding articles, the British North America Act, now called The Constitution Act, 1867, established in section 18 the privileges, immunities and powers of Parliament. These privileges are expressed further in the Parliament of Canada Act and in our Standing Orders. In his landmark ruling last year on the Afghan detainees documents, the Speaker upheld the supremacy of Parliament and the right to order documents. He affirmed the House's undisputed role as the grand inquest of the nation and its need for complete and accurate information in order to fulfill its duty of holding this government and any government to account.

Yet over the last five years of this Conservative government, the House has been required to cite its privileges at a rate never seen before in our modern history. Our esteemed law clerk, Mr. Robert Walsh, has never been so busy. Repeatedly he is asked to attend committees to remind them of their rights and privileges when confronted with attempts at obstruction by the government. The examples are numerous: government ministers refusing requests to appear before committees; senior Conservative staff members evading bailiffs with summonses; documents not provided or seriously redacted; and the list goes on and on and on. When committees request documents, the government drags its feet. It obstructs, and when it runs out of options, it flat-out refuses.

There are books that document the amount and degree of Conservative government obstruction. Mr. Lawrence Martin, in Harperland: The Politics of Control, a runner-up for the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing at the Writers' Trust of Canada awards yesterday, provides a lengthy list of the Prime Minister's march of audacities.

Since the 2006 election campaign, here are some of the highlights, with due acknowledgement, of course, to Mr. Martin: the elimination of the access to information database; the nixing of the court challenges program; the secret handbook on how to obstruct committees; hiding justice department studies on crime; hiding a firearms report to prevent embarrassment on the gun registry; the Rights & Democracy fiasco; slashing the budget of the Parliamentary Budget Officer; withholding details of the stimulus funding, and we all know why that happened; firing the nuclear agency head, Linda Keen; halting Peter Tinsley's probe on the Afghan detainees; ousting Paul Kennedy from the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP; smearing a career diplomat, Mr. Richard Colvin; defying Parliament's right to documents; padlocking Parliament by proroguing not once but twice; the move on Statistics Canada; and the list goes on and on and on.

Bonnie Crombie