Miliken Ruling

Peter Miliken's ruling this week gave Parliament the power to decide which of the thousands of pages of material on the Afghan detainee controversy could be released to the public.

The Conservatives had already hired former Supreme Court Judge Frank Iacobucci to decide which documents could be published. However, Iacobucci was supposed to report to the government, not to Parliament.

Michael Ignatieff suggested that Iacobucci's mandate could simply be changed to have him report to Parliament rather than the government. The Bloc and NDP are categorally against this proposal, and want instead for select MPs -who would be sworn to secrecy- to decide which documents are fit for publication.

The opposition parties need to compromise. The Bloc and NDP are right to point out that, given the historic nature of the Speaker's ruling, Parliament should not respond by hiring a proxy to undertake a function to which it just laid claim. But MPs have neither the time nor the expertise to make informed decisions on which documents to release. Hence Frank Iacobucci.

The solution is simple. Follow Michael Ignatieff's suggestion by getting Iacobucci to report to Parliament, and put in charge a small group of MPs to supervise his work. That way, if Mr. Iacobucci ever wanted to hide information that would reflect poorly on the government, Parliament would be able to overrule him.