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Both opposition parties were disappointed in the leak and say they are looking into whether it can be formally investigated or is a breach of their parliamentary privilege.

“I’m disappointed in the leak,” LeClair said at his first big press conference at Queen’s Park. “It does damage the trust.”

He said the leak did not come from his office — it is standard practice that reports from legislative officers are not made public until tabled in the legislature. It’s a point of parliamentary privilege that MPPs get to see it first. He said only the ministries of finance and energy had copies and he might now consider not giving government officials advance versions of his reports in the future.

“This leak means I’ll have to revisit how we undertake our work,” LeClair said.

Finance Minister Charles Sousa said in question period the report was not leaked by his ministry or the energy ministry.

This comes after LeClair’s report details a strained process to obtain information from the government. He said many of the documents he requested were kept back as the Ontario Liberals claimed Cabinet confidence. LeClair said he understood that sensitivity but also said some of the hard, financial numbers he sought could have been shared with the confidential aspects stripped out.

“As a new office it’s going to take some time for us to develop relationships with the government and with the MPPs in the legislature,” LeClair said.

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And that relationship is integral to functioning legislative offices, according to University of Waterloo associate professor of political science Emmett MacFarlane. He said we don’t know for sure if the leak came from the government, but if it did that’s troubling.