Bill C-11 Committee on March 13th, 2012

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Thank you, Mr. Angus.

Now that amendment NDP-14 has been moved and spoken to, we can only proceed with amendment NDP-14, because it's identical to amendment Lib-12. We will no longer proceed with amendment Lib-12.

Is there any discussion on amendment NDP-14? I have Mr. Del Mastro and then Mr. Regan.

Mr. Del Mastro.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

In going through the process of listening to witnesses on this bill, one thing remains fundamentally clear to me and to members on the government side. To begin with, we heard from representatives from Music Canada. We heard from representatives from the Canadian film industry and others. We heard from software creators. We heard from gaming creators. We heard from a very broad cross-section that was very clear about the fact that without the ability to protect their work, without the ability to ensure that their work cannot simply be taken without remuneration for that work, technical protection measures are critical.

As we've said many times, we believe that this is a business-to-consumer decision. The market will determine whether or not TPMs are supported.

I raised many times, I believe, on Bill C-32 that I have bought hundreds of CDs and hundreds of DVDs. If I'm not allowed to format-shift them, I just won't buy any more of them. It's up to the companies that have created them to determine whether they want to allow me the ability to format-shift them.

New technologies are coming out all the time. The cloud that's been created by TBD Networks and others has virtually eliminated the need to buy your own copies of works, and people pay a monthly fee for that. The decision to take advantage of that is a decision being made by consumers right across this country.

What we do know, and we know very clearly, is that Music Canada came in and indicated that some $800 million in revenues has gone missing. That's money that's not going to artists. It's money that's not being reinvested in the industry. And it's money that is being lost each and every day by the Canadian economy.

We know that the film industry came in and said that for their industry, it has been more than $1 billion. That's money, again, that's not being invested in Canada. That's jobs that are not being created in Toronto, Montreal, or British Columbia, or in any other of the provinces and regions in this country where great films have been made and where more could in fact be made.

We also know that companies such as Google and ESA and others have indicated that their investment in Canada could grow, and will grow, if we put in place the kinds of protections they need. These protections, under technical protection measures, are critical for enabling the next generation in communications.

Those who have suggested that we can allow folks to simply breach TPMs for non-infringing purposes are being blissfully naive to the reality that this will in fact enable the piracy we have seen in this country, the piracy this bill seeks to put an end to. And frankly, it will cripple what has been an effort to ensure that those who create copyrighted materials are in fact paid for those copyrighted materials.

These amendments being sought by the opposition on this specific clause would render many of the other measures in this bill meaningless. That's why we can't support them.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Thank you, Mr. Del Mastro.

Now we go to Mr. Regan.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

In view of what Mr. Del Mastro has said, I think it's important to keep in mind that what this amendment would do--and it is identical to the amendment that we proposed, so I will be supporting it--is it would basically say it's okay to circumvent a digital lock if you're doing it for a lawful purpose. If you're doing it for an unlawful purpose--to distribute it, to sell it, to share it with all kinds of friends--that's not okay. But if you bought a movie, and you're a mother and you want to transfer it to your iPod, iPad, or preferably, PlayBook, of course--it being a Canadian product--so that the child can watch it as you're driving to grandma's house, this amendment would enable you to do that. But under the bill as written, you couldn't do that. It would be illegal. You'd be a criminal if you were a mother doing that for your child so they could watch this movie you've paid good money for. The government doesn't feel you should be able to do that.

We also heard from a librarian. I want to remind members of what we heard from Nancy Marrelli, who is from the Canadian Council of Archives. She said:

Let me give you a fictional example of how Bill C-11 might affect archives. An archives holds a copy of a CD on the history of a small Ontario company that built and sold distinctive cast-iron stoves throughout Canada over a period of 150 years. It was the main industry in the small town that grew up around the factory. The CD was created by a small communications group that came together briefly in 1985 as the company was closing its doors. The CD deposited by the family that owned the factory includes photographs, oral history interviews with the owners and several generations of workers and customers, company catalogues, and some film footage of the factory. Only one copy of the CD remains. The communications group disbanded when a fire destroyed its offices and all the original material it had collected for the project. As the lifespan of this important CD approaches obsolescence, the archives wishes to ensure the important documentary heritage it contains is preserved for posterity in a suitable format. But the CD is protected with a digital lock and the archives has not succeeded in locating the original creators. If the archives cannot circumvent the digital lock to preserve the unique historical material the CD contains, an important part of our documentary history will be lost as the CD becomes obsolete and the files become unreadable.

Now, what we haven't heard from the government, Mr. Chairman, is an answer to that objection. We haven't heard how on earth archives are going to get around that. We haven't heard how it's not going to be illegal for that young mother to transfer the movie she's paid for onto her PlayBook.

That's why I think this amendment is required. What the government seems to want to do is preserve old models and ignore the fact that we have moved into a digital world. We have services, premium services that are in fact profit-making, succeeding very well. I heard recently from students who work on software, who write software at Carleton University. I met with them last week about their view on this. They know the digital world very well, and they see this bill as trying to stick us with an old model that won't work in the current environment.

I think there is a need for this. My colleague Mr. Del Mastro talked about Music Canada losing $800 million a year or something. The difficulty with that argument.... Is he really suggesting that with this bill, they will now recover that, they'll get it back? I don't think he's really suggesting they're suddenly going to put digital locks on and therefore get $800 million in revenue back that they've lost in the last few years. If he is, I'd like to hear his argument about how they--or the film industry, for that matter--are going to suddenly recover all that money because of this bill.

The other thing, of course, is that this seems to be driven by.... We've heard, and we've seen evidence of this in WikiLeaks, that this is driven by U.S. corporate interests. The government seems to be succumbing to that. The funny thing is that this would actually take us further than the situation currently in the U.S., in view of court decisions there.

So I will be supporting this amendment.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Thank you, Mr. Regan.

Mr. Angus.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you.

I just wanted to clarify something for my colleague, because whenever we talk about the legal rights of Canadians, he thinks it's the Chicken Little amendment and that the whole world is going to collapse. I just want to clarify that we are not talking about a bill that endorses widespread piracy. We're not talking about undermining the technological protection measure provisions, the infringement provisions, the statutory damage provisions. Those are all still in place.

What we're talking about is the legal right of Canadians to engage in legal acts without being criminalized. If we make that amendment, the sky is not going to fall. I just want to reassure him.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Thank you, Mr. Angus.

Any further discussion on NDP amendment 14?

Seeing none, I'll call the question, asking for a show of hands.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Recorded vote, please

(Amendment negatived: nays 7; yeas 5)

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Moving on to NDP amendment 15, Mr. Angus.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

I'll turn it over to my colleague Monsieur Labelle.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Are you moving the amendment?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Yes.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

So you're moving the amendment.

Monsieur Dionne Labelle.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

This is the second half of our attempt to link the criminal intent to get around a digital lock to the notion of copyright. I am quite partial to this amendment.

It refers to the intent behind the act. In my view and as Mr. Angus so eloquently stated, the digital lock provisions should not be applied blindly. Doing so would be dogmatic and ideological.

Mr. Angus and Mr. Regan gave a number of examples of situations in which regular people breaking digital locks unintentionally or without criminal intent would have the presumption of guilt imposed on them.

That could also harm innovation and competition. Consumers have also pointed to problems.

I want to come back to another side of the digital lock debate. I would point out that the federal government is now dictating how to handle course notes and run a classroom, activities that are the domain of the province.

A number of witnesses have said that, on top of the challenges I just mentioned, the digital lock system again raises constitutional concerns. Even though the federal government is entitled to regulate trade, in accordance with the applicable section of our Constitution, the provinces have exclusive jurisdiction over contractual obligation matters. A serious concern has been raised to the effect that end-user licence and application agreements involving digital locks are indeed contracts pertaining to protection measures or e-commerce rules, which are the exclusive jurisdiction of the province. As a result, they cannot be legitimately regulated by the federal government, whose role in this area is limited strictly to copyright.

Lawyers will have a field day with that debate in court. This bill is going to fuel legal disputes in many areas for years to come, especially in Quebec, whose Civil Code contains unique French-language protection measures. You can't simply cast aside these concerns out of hand. These concerns may be of no importance to a government that did not even have the courtesy to ask a single question in French while this controversial bill was being studied. However, I can assure you that they are extremely important to the members of the Quebec nation, which Parliament recognized. We urge you not to meddle in the province's domain.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Thank you, Mr. Dionne Labelle.

Any further discussion from the New Democrats?

Okay, I'm seeing Mr. Regan. You have discussion, for five minutes.

I should mention, though, before I get to you, Mr. Regan, that NDP-15 is identical to Liberal amendment 13, so since this one has been moved, we will no longer be proceeding with Liberal amendment 13.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

You guys are no fun at all.

That keeps happening around here. At least we have the amendment being moved. I will be supporting this amendment, and I certainly encourage my Conservative colleagues to consider it. I know that they have voted against every opposition motion to amend so far. I hope they recognize that I voted for some of their amendments, and I voted for some NDP amendments, because I try to consider which are reasonable, which will improve the bill and which will not.

I recall, in fact, a few weeks ago, when Mr. Rae was speaking in the House on this bill, that Mr. Moore was calling from across the way, saying, "I'll bet you $10,000 we'll accept significant amendments.” I should have taken him up on that bet. I could use that $10,000. I don't see significant amendments being passed that make substantive changes to this bill. This certainly would be a positive amendment.

I sympathize with my colleagues, considering that I know there's some fear of Mr. O'Connor. I appreciate that. He's a pretty stern guy, and maybe they want to stay on whatever committee they're on, or they feel they're just a short time away from going into cabinet. I should tell them that I appreciate that. The cabinet experience is certainly an interesting one, but it can be very ephemeral. It can be fleeting. It can last only a short time, if you get there at all, and there's no certainty of getting there in this business.

So I hope they will reconsider their position, and take on their responsibilities as MPs to be here, to think seriously about amendments, and not just vote as they are told by the Prime Minister's Office.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Thank you, Mr. Regan.

Is there any further discussion on NDP-15? Seeing none, I will call the question.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

I would like a recorded division.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

A recorded division is called for.

(Amendment negatived: nays 7; yeas 5)

Now moving on to amendment NDP-16, Mr. Angus, will this amendment be moved?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Yes, we will be moving this amendment. I'll turn the floor to my colleague, Mr. Cash.

[Andrew Cash, NDP, Davenport, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We'll try this one more time, a third kick at the can here.

We need to be clear here that when we state in our amendment the term “lawful purpose”, it does not mean piracy. I want to refer back to something Mr. Del Mastro said about Music Canada losing $800 million. He didn't say that Music Canada and the music industry lost $800 million due to piracy.

That's not what you said. But if that's what you meant, it's hard to believe that you would take $50 million off the table for artists and music stakeholders, if you're so concerned about the music industry. It's hard to believe, sir. This is one of the ironies or hypocrisies—whatever you want to call it—of the government's position as it pertains to artists in this bill.

We've also got a serious concern about users and the blanket criminalization of consumers. This is why over 50,000 people have signed the OpenMedia.ca petition to not lock down the Internet. We're not talking about pirates here. We're talking about regular Canadians and their regular use of the Internet.

The purpose of this amendment is to create a blanket protection under clause 47 for violation breaking or other evasions of a digital lock for any legal purpose.

It is sad, when one reflects, that we've come to such a point that we must propose amendments to clarify that Canadians who aren't breaking the law aren't breaking the law. Nonetheless, the risks of this government's absolute digital locks policy, a policy we know has been tried and failed miserably in the jurisdiction of our largest trading partner and closest ally, the United States, are so great that they warrant this extraordinary effort.

I'll spare everyone further details and examples of how the government's maximal approach is going to harm Canadian users of the Internet. I will simply ask, with the greatest of respect, that our Conservative colleagues take this third, final chance to fix a glaring flaw in this bill on behalf of the 35 million Canadians who look to us for national leadership on this and many other issues.

Thanks.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Thank you, Mr. Cash.

Is there any further discussion on this amendment? Seeing none, I will call the question on NDP amendment 16.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

A recorded vote, please.

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

A recorded vote called for by Mr. Regan.

(Amendment negatived: nays 7; yeas 5)

Moving on to NDP amendment 17, Mr. Angus, will that amendment be moved?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Yes, and I'll turn it over to my colleague, Monsieur Dionne Labelle.