Opposition members are demanding Prime Minister Stephen Harper table in the House of Commons the search warrant that led to this week's raid on Conservative Party headquarters.

Elections Canada official Andre Thouin carries a box as he leaves the Conservative Party headquarters in Ottawa on Tuesday.
(Tom Hanson/Canadian Press)

Elections Canada officials with RCMP escorts first wheeled out what looked like boxes of documents from the party's offices on Tuesday, as camera crews and a Liberal research team recorded the event.

It remains unclear exactly what Elections Canada is looking for, as the search warrants and affidavits pertaining to the warrant remain sealed.

Several media organizations, including the CBC, are preparing to argue in court to have them unsealed.

The party and Elections Canada have been in a protracted legal battle over alleged campaign spending irregularities from the 2006 election.

The Conservatives are accusing Elections Canada of creating a media "circus" out of the raid, which they have linked to their civil lawsuit against Elections Canada.

But opposition parties have suggested in the House that the search warrant was instead potentially part of a "quasi-criminal" investigation into an alleged "in-and-out" scheme by the Tories to circumvent Election Canada's caps on campaign advertising spending.

"Will the prime minister consent to unseal the warrant documents, which convinced the court that the drastic gesture of an RCMP raid was necessary?" Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion asked during Thursday's question period.

Responding for the government, House Leader Peter Van Loan said the Tories wanted answers regarding the search as well, as the party had provided every document Elections Canada had requested.

"We have not seen the affidavit," Van Loan said. "It's going to require the consent of Elections Canada to release that to us or anyone else."

But Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe dismissed Van Loan's assertion, questioning what prevented the government from "tabling in the House what they have in their hands."

"They wonder why they're treated differently than other parties? It's because they acted differently than other parties," Duceppe told the House in French.

Liberal Deputy Leader Michael Ignatieff went even further, accusing the prime minister of "obstructing the institution charged with protecting the integrity of our political system."

"Who does he think he is?" Ignatieff said.

Elections Canada 'unfair' to Tories: Van Loan

Van Loan said the government views Elections Canada's position in the dispute as "unfair" to the Tories, citing a recent decision in favour of Liberal MP Bob Rae as an example of Elections Canada being wrong in their interpretation of election laws.

"We want to see the same treatment for our party that every other party gets," Van Loan said. "That's why we took Elections Canada to court."

Elections Canada has said the RCMP executed the search warrant at the request of William Corbett, commissioner of elections. 

Corbett, who enforces the Elections Canada Act, launched an investigation in April 2007 after chief electoral officer Marc Mayrand challenged the Tory spending claims in the 2006 election.

The Conservative Party of Canada, having reached the $18.3-million advertising spending limit set out under the Canada Elections Act, transferred cash to 66 local campaign offices.

The local campaigns sent the money back to national party headquarters to buy local television and radio advertisements for their candidates.

Elections Canada says the advertisements produced through the local offices didn't qualify as local spending because they were too similar to national ads. 

The ads looked exactly the same as the national ads, except for small print or the names of the individual candidates.

Financial agents for some of the Conservative candidates later asked to be reimbursed for those expenses, which came to a total of $1.3 million. Candidates who get 10 per cent of the votes in their riding get a portion of their election expenses returned from Elections Canada.

Elections Canada refused, saying the party, not the candidates, paid for the ads.

The Conservatives maintain they didn't break any rules.

With files from the Canadian Press