For The Record: House Speaker Andrew Scheer dismisses F-35 privilege claim ...

... but leaves door open to revisiting the matter if evidence of deliberate attempt to mislead comes to light: 

"[U]ltimately the Chair has before it two clear statements: the first contained in the report of the Auditor General that some costs were not fully provided to Ministers and Members; and the second, by the Government House Leader accepting the conclusions of the Auditor General.

In my view, no clear evidence has been presented beyond this and thus, the Chair has no choice but to conclude that, it cannot find that Ministers knew or believed that what they were telling the House was not true or that it was intended to be misleading. In other words, the criteria of demonstrating that Ministers knew their statements to the House were incorrect, and that they intended to mislead the House, has not been met.

Accordingly, bound as I am by the very narrow parameters that apply in these situations, and without any evidence that the House was deliberately misled, I cannot arrive at a finding of prima facie privilege in this case.

The House will be aware, however, that the StandingCommittee on Public Accounts has, as part of its ongoing mandate, the responsibility to review and report on all reports of the Auditor General. The House knows that the Committee is seized of the report that has given rise to this question of privilege and is at present proceeding with its examination of the report.

I remind the House that a determination that a breach of privilege is not prima facie at this time in no way interferes with the right of any Honourable member to raise a new question of privilege should the committee arrive at findings that shed new light on this matter, or should other pertinent information become available.