Mr. Speaker, I rise on a Point of Order today because I believe that a Member may have misled the House. Mr. Speaker, while the statement that leads me to this conclusion happened some time ago, it was not until August 15th of this year that it became apparent that Members had been misled. This is the first occasion the House has been in session since then and, therefore, the first occasion I have had to raise the issue.

Mr. Speaker, I will set out the details now. On February 21, 2003, Minister Antoine was asked in Oral Question 68-14(6) about the status of revisions for the business incentive policy by Mrs. Groenewegen. According to Hansard, in return to that question he said, "I have to work with my colleagues on the other side and the direction to date is not to move forward at this point in time because of one area with regard to cost. We are saying that we could probably leave this for the time being and introduce a registry to gauge what the costs are to have this policy in place. So at this point in time, the decision is for us to not proceed..." Mr. Speaker, with this statement, the Minister clearly advised the House, and since he used the royal "we," the government would not proceed with implementation of revisions to BIP. As his department, RWED, is responsible for developing the revised BIP and he was the lead Minister on the file, Members have every reason to take his word that no changes would occur.

Then, Mr. Speaker, on August 15, 2003, the Minister held a press conference to announce that the BIP was being revised as originally set out. So, Mr. Speaker, the Minister told the House that the policy would not be changed in February, then announced that it would be changed in August when Members were not in session. Had the Minister told the Members in February that he was still considering implementing the changes, Members would have had an opportunity, either in the winter or the spring session, to debate the issue, but the Members understood that we had the Minister's word that no changes were forthcoming. The Minister had further opportunity in June to set the record straight when we had our spring session, but he again failed to notify Members that he was considering such changes. Following meetings with committee, the Minister knew there was considerable interest in this issue and a lot of opposition to the proposed changes.

Mr. Speaker, by the way the Minister has handled this issue, he has deprived Members of the opportunity to debate significant change to a very important government policy. His statement in February that the policy would not be changed left Members no opportunity to publicly question the government. By that statement and his actions on August 15th, I submit he has misled the House. I believe the Minister owes this House, at the very least, an apology and a commitment not to implement the new policy until we have debated it in this House.