Second thoughts

Following up on this afternoon's post, let's note a couple of issues with the contents of (and spin on) the final detainee document agreement which has since been released.

First off, I'll stick to my initial interpretation that on its face, the agreement wouldn't seem to prevent the MPs on the committee from reviewing documents subject to a claim of Cabinet confidence or solicitor-client privilege. But if the Libs plan on interpreting the agreement to accept that they won't have access to those documents, then the fact that the deal could be interpreted more favourably if they pressed the point won't do anybody much good.

And that in turn undoes any good in the fact that the preamble has changed from the previous version: does it help the opposition's position later on to soften the non-binding portion of the agreement if the Libs are willing to apply a class-based claim to solicitor-client privilege even in a case where legal advice is at the centre of the issue?

Second, I'll respond to Steve's concerns about renewal of the agreement by noting that the potential for the Cons to back out doesn't cover the half of it. Here's the renewal provision:

This Memorandum of Understanding survives a dissolution of Parliament provided that the leaders of the governing party and each opposition party with recognized status in the House of Commons following a general election sign a Memorandum in the same terms in the next Parliament.

Presumably that provision was drafted when all four current parties were expected to participate. But I'm not sure why nobody thought to ask whether it should be left in the same form once the NDP decided not to participate, as it would have seemed simple enough to rewrite the provision to apply only to parties participating in the agreement.

But that point apparently didn't occur to any of the parties to the agreement - or was allowed to slip past. And as a result, the agreement on its own terms ceases to be effective unless the NDP - despite its having chosen not to participate in the current Parliament - changes its mind and also signs on following an election.