Certainly Parliament has decided that there's a much higher consent standard for the private sector than for the public sector, because there's almost no consent standard. There is a requirement in the Privacy Act that you should only use personal information without the consent of the individual for very, very limited purposes.
I was trying to turn the tables on you, in a way, by asking who set the consent standard for Statistics Canada; it was Parliament, particularly for the census of population. My recollection is that most of the rest of their surveys are consensual. They don't come to you and say “You're in this survey for five years.” So it's not a good example of the consent thing.
If you go to your doctor, he's operating on the basis of informed consent. If you go to the bank nowadays--and it should be the same with Revenue Canada--in the initial transaction you have with them you should know what their privacy practices are, that they don't disclose your identifiable personal information to anybody without your consent. And they're pretty good at that. I have an accountant who does work for my company. They make me get a signature, through my accountant, to Revenue Canada, that the accountant can discuss my personal affairs. They're very cautious.