Parliamentary privilege in Canada 2d ed.

by J.P. Joseph Maingot, Q.C., published by House of Commons and McGill-Queen's University Press, 1997, pp. xxiv, 404

Privilege does not really fit into the traditional definition of parliamentary procedure since it involves legal rights, but there is no doubt that without it, the heritage of parliamentary government with which we in Canada have been blessed would never have been established. Neither the application nor the theory of privilege has remained static since the publication in 1982 of Mr. Maingot's first edition so this updated version is most welcome.

In the United Kingdom, the Parliamentary Corporate Bodies Act, which allows Parliament to sue and be sued, was adopted in 1992. In that same year, the House of Lords sitting in its judicial capacity relaxed the rule excluding parliamentary material from the courts in the case of Pepper v. Hart. In 1995, the prestigious Commons Committee on Privileges was remodelled as the Committee on Standards and Privileges and in 1996 the effect of article IX of the Bill of Rights of 1689 was altered by the adoption of section 13 of the Defamation Act. All aspects of parliamentary privilege are now subject to review by a Special Joint Committee on Parliamentary Privilege struck in 1997. Its report is expected in the coming months. In Australia, the Parliamentary Privileges Act was adopted in 1987 which, among other subjects, legally defines what is covered by the Bill of Rights' article IX and protected from the courts.

In Canada, there have also been important developments. In 1991, an amendment to the Parliament of Canada Act was adopted giving the Internal Economies of both Houses exclusive authority to determine whether any use of funds by members was proper. In 1998, the Quebec National Assembly passed a bill entitling a member or a former member to the payment of defence and judicial costs arising out of proceedings brought against them in the performance of their duties. Important jurisprudence was created; for example, the 1985 Reference Re Language Rights in Manitoba in which the courts held that all of Manitoba's laws after 1870 were invalid because of the failure to use the French language in records, journals and enactments; and MacLean v. the Attorney General of Nova Scotia (1987) where the courts ruled that the legislature may remove, suspend or expel a member with immunity. Privilege has also been the subject of two graduate Canadian university theses: Peter Bernhardt's The...