Monday, March 15, 2010

On limited access

In addition to offering some background on the solicitor-client privilege issue raised in my post yesterday, Kady has plenty more on the Iacobucci terms of reference - featuring in particular a serious problem with the lack of any ability to look past the documents the Cons want to provide to him:
Meanwhile, buried in the the fine print devoted to detailing exactly which documents he'll be reviewing, we see the reappearance of that oddly Orwellian phrase that Nicholson employed when first announcing the appointment two weeks ago. Iacobucci will, it seems, conduct "independent confidential review of the information that is proposed [by the government] to be withheld from release."

As a commenter pointed out earlier, it sounds for all the world like Iacobucci will be acting as a specialized ministerial ATIP advisor, with no special ability to force the department to turn over any additional material of which he could, in theory, become aware only after he begins his review of the documents provided, despite the words "all other relevant documents" having been tacked onto the end of his to-do list.

Without the power to subpoena testimony or records, he won't know whether he actually has all of the relevant material, or only that which the government is willing to deliver to the House after it goes through the censors.

No comments:

Post a Comment