Senator Gold: That is a very good question. The short answer is no. The parliamentary review committee will not be required to have the level of security clearance necessary to review confidential security information. We have an institution, the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, or NSICOP, where the members are cleared and do have access to such information. Information of that kind is shared with those members on an as-needed basis.

I was referring, Senator Patterson, to those regulations that, by law, are not to be published in Canada Gazette, but to make sure that all regulations — even those under the Statutory Instruments Act that are exempted from publication — are nonetheless reviewed by this committee, which, if I recall, has to take an oath of secrecy but does not otherwise have the security clearance that would be required for intelligence information to be shared. I hope that answers your question.

Senator Gold: Thank you for your question. There are different categories of information with different levels of protection and different levels of access. As you note in the text of the act, every member of the parliamentary review committee would be required to take an oath of secrecy as set out in the schedule. But there is nothing in the act that requires members to have been given a security clearance, such as, for example, members in this chamber who sit on the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, or NSICOP, have been required to go through and which gives them access on an as-needed basis — not at large; even that is constrained — to information that is otherwise not made public to parliamentarians under any other circumstances.

So, of course, it is important — to return to your question, Senator Quinn — in order for the parliamentary review committee to do the job we expect it to do, the job that the drafters of the bill expect it to do, that the committee needs to and will have access to all relevant information that is made available. In this case, and you alluded to it, there will be some measures — not intelligence information I hasten to add, but certain regulations that may be promulgated. There are none that exist now and there are none that are contemplated, as I said. But were such regulations to be promulgated that by the operation of the Statutory Instruments Act could not be for reasons that it contains confidential information published in the Canada Gazette and therefore available to the public, then, yes, that committee would have access in private to that information to help it inform its decision. Again, I hope that answers your question.