Senator Tannas: I sure don’t want to make my friend and colleague Senator Gold uncomfortable, but you are right, Senator Batters. Senator George Baker, whose memory lives on in the chamber here — if we know him well enough, he is probably home in Newfoundland watching right now — used to talk about how the courts followed and based judgments on transcripts from the Senate.

One of the most important things that we have as an officer of the government is that we can ask a question of — and in fact we did it on Bill C-15 last spring where Senator Gold made declarations that could ultimately be important in court in the future.

So if for no other reason than that, I would say it doesn’t have to be an epic speech, but to get up, say some words and allow questions like that to be put on the record is something I would hope maybe Senator Gold might think about in the future.

It’s a very good point, Senator Batters.

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