But even after the Speaker's comment, Barrow still didn't back down. He presented his privilege motion in the House, which was, of course, rejected by the deputy Speaker, Marconi Leal.
Outside the House, he told us that he doesn't believe he should go in front of the Privileges Committee since his correspondence with the Speaker happened outside the House - and the rules don't apply.
He added that the Speaker could have amended his motion in the ten days that he submitted it prior to the meeting, but chose not to.
Shyne Barrow, Leader of the Opposition
"If they want to change the standing orders to say that when I leave the House of Representatives, in my communication with the Speaker, I have to talk to her in a certain way, that's something that the majority will always have the power to do. But this is a free society, and I have free speech, that's why when I leave the House, if I say something that is defamatory, I will be liable. But in the House, I have immunity, so that means there are different laws that govern inside the House and outside the House, so this idea that me communicating with the Speaker outside the House should be governed by the rules of the House is preposterous. I'm happy that she read what I wrote to her because it is my honest truth. I believe that there is a pattern here, I can only bring one privilege motion at a time but initially I wanted to bring a privilege motion for the denial of the redistricting intervention that I wanted to do that is not being tabled that for many of the reasons that I was way ahead along with my party, criticizing their redistricting efforts and at the end of the day, why are we here? We are here because people elected us."
"And as I mentioned in my privilege motion presentation, there's a standing order that allows the Speaker to alter what it is that you submit to conform with the standing orders. So if she's saying I'm imputing improper motives, there's no imputation to say about the allegations."
"So she could have altered that to say well allegations of malfeasance and allegation of nonfeasance but this is what I'm saying. The Speaker chair can't be so revered and can't be so above reproach without he or her doing all they can to facilitate democracy."
"I don't even see how that gets to a privilege committee, I would go to court immediately on that because that didn't happen in the House and if you notice, when I did raise my privilege motion, I was careful but when I'm speaking outside of the House as I'm speaking now, I have free speech."
