Madam Speaker: I have two rulings for the House.

On April 18 during Question Period I took under advisement a point of order raised by the opposition House leader (Mr. Ashton). His point of order concerned the following words used by the honourable Minister of Health (Mr. McCrae): “honourable members opposite might condone threatening and intimidating actions against home care workers, but they will not threaten or intimidate me.”

Having reviewed Hansard, I am ruling that strictly speaking the opposition House leader did not have a point of order. However, I wish to give a very strong caution to the honourable Minister of Health; his words did come exceedingly close to being out of order. As well, in the minister's advice to me on the point of order on April 18 he went on to say “These people”--in reference to members of the opposition--“cannot be bullies like we see out on the streets of Winnipeg.” The phrase “the honourable Leader of the Opposition thinks that he can bully his way around here” was ruled out of order in this Chamber on October 5, and the member speaking was asked to withdraw that phrase. I would remind the minister and indeed all members that inflammatory language does nothing to enhance the decorum and workings of this Chamber.

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On April 22 the honourable member for Kildonan (Mr. Chomiak) raised a matter of privilege and moved “That this House do censure the Minister of Health for a breach of the privileges of its members in the matter of information made available about the privatization of home care, a misrepresentation of reports and background documents on this issue, and that this matter be referred to the Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections.”

In his submission on the matter, the honourable member for Kildonan I believe made three points: (1) he alleged that the minister had said one thing in the Chamber and something else outside the Chamber in regard to the existence of reports on contracting out of home care services; (2) he alleged that a document tabled by the minister during Committee of Supply on April 19 appeared to have been altered because pages were missing; and (3) he referenced the inability or incapacity of the minister to deal with issues.

In speaking to the matter of privilege, the honourable Minister of Health (Mr. McCrae) noted that when he tabled the document in question, he had told the committee that the pages were misnumbered and that the pagination was incorrect but that he had been assured by people in his department that all of the pages that were part of the original document were included in the document the minister tabled on April 19. I have reviewed the Hansard of that day, and it confirms that the minister had clearly referenced the pagination errors in the document he was tabling.

A matter of privilege is a serious matter. Beauchesne's Citation 26.(3) indicates that the Speaker cannot rule on a question of privilege. The Speaker's function is limited to deciding if a prima facie case has been established, i.e., whether the matter is of such a character as to entitle the motion, which the member who has raised the question desires to move, to priority over Orders of the Day. Beauchesne also in Citations 115 and 117 states that the matter must be brought to the attention of the House at the first possible opportunity.

I am satisfied that the honourable member for Kildonan (Mr. Chomiak) did raise the matter at the earliest opportunity. That leaves us with the question of whether a prima facie case has been made. There are a number of Speakers' rulings on this point, but in particular I would reference the March 16, 1993, ruling which has some similarities to the matter before us at present. That ruling cites the Canadian authority on the subject of privilege, Joseph Maingot. He clearly states that “An allegation of misleading the House is not out of order or unparliamentary; nor does it amount to a question of privilege.”

The ruling just referred to and several earlier ones dealing with circumstances similar to the current issue include the statement that a motion of privilege should be worded in such a way that another member is alleged to have deliberately or intentionally misled the House and that a member must support his or her charge with proof of intent.

In the arguments put forward by the honourable member for Kildonan, he did not put forward any evidence to show that the Minister of Health had deliberately misled the House or intended to do so when making statements about the existence of certain reports. As to the question of the document tabled by the minister on April 19, again there is no proof that the minister deliberately gave the House an altered document. The third point made by the honourable member for Kildonan (Mr. Chomiak) concerned the competence of the minister. Maingot, on page 191 of his book Parliamentary Privilege in Canada, says “. . . allegations of misjudgment, or mismanagement or maladministration on the part of a Minister in the performance of his ministerial duties do not come within the purview of parliamentary privilege.”

For these reasons I must rule that the honourable member for Kildonan has failed to establish a prima facie case of privilege.

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