Former defence minister Perrin Beatty, who drafted the Emergencies Act in the 1980s to replace the controversial War Measures Act, says transparency is crucial in the government’s inquiry into the invocation of emergency powers earlier this year.
The inquiry may be able to make its conclusions without interfering with cabinet confidence, but it will be up to the Liberal government to be transparent enough to convince Canadians that the measures were needed, Beatty said in a recent interview with The Canadian Press.
“If you don’t have [transparency], then people will always have their suspicions that something has been withheld,” he said.
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