Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen members, thank you for your invitation. I am pleased to be here with you. For 10 years, I was used to appearing before the committees of the National Assembly. I've only been here once; so it's with some apprehension that I've come back. I won't read all my remarks, but I would simply like to make a twofold admission at the outset: I am a member of the Privacy Commissioner's external advisory committee, and I also wrote a study for the Commissioner on oversight agencies in the countries of La Francophonie. So I would like to avoid any idea of conflict of interest.
I would also like to say that I am not a theoretician. I will be addressing your topic from the viewpoint of a practitioner, which is what I was for 10 years during my term as chair of Quebec's access to information commission, which is concerned with both access to information and privacy.
I would like to draw your attention to three aspects, which are moreover quite directly related to the 10 proposals submitted by Commissioner Stoddart. The first is the reaffirmation of the fact that, with respect to your work, this is a study of a fundamental right, a right that is reaffirmed by the Constitution, or virtually so, by members of Parliament, the Supreme Court and doctrine on the subject. The consequence is very clear: with respect to a fundamental right, there cannot be two standards, one for the private sector, the other for the public sector. Citizens are entitled to the same respect for that fundamental right, regardless of which side of the fence they are on. That is why I have a practical suggestion to make on the subject, which is that you cheat the classic ombudsman model and, in certain areas, confer decision-making powers, concrete powers on the Commissioner to meet needs and to join the universal trend in this matter. If you have any questions on that, I can answer them.
My second point is the exemplary role that government must play in the implementation and respect of a fundamental right. In my view, it's unthinkable that government shouldn't have the same obligations and not be subject to the same restrictions as the private sector. And yet that's currently the case, when you take a close look at the two statutes, that concerning the private sector and the other concerning the public sector. In that sense, I think some of the Commissioner's recommendations are entirely consistent with this rebalancing of the two acts governing the same right.
Third, I would also like to encourage you to take a look ahead of or outside the problem that has brought us here today. Very simply put, the work, research and solutions in the privacy field are now being developed in large part in Europe, not the United States. The United States had the lead in this field. They innovated. They launched the Privacy Act, which was used as a model around the world, but they are now distinctly lagging behind and out of sync with a certain number of countries.
I would suggest that the Canadian government take advantage of its ties with the European Union to ensure that the Privacy Commissioner is, in one way or another, associated with the work of what's called in the language of Brussels the Article 29 Working Party, which consists of all the European commissioners in the field and which is the centre of research, innovation and especially dialogue with the United States. The Europeans have problems with the United States regarding personal information transactions and have structured a dialogue that I think could be helpful to us and wouldn't result in Canada being isolated in its dialogue with the United States. There will be a Canada-European Union summit in Quebec City in October. I think that could be an item on the agenda: how to involve the Commissioner in the business of that group? This is currently the fundamental international group in the area of privacy, especially, in the consideration of the impact of new technologies and inventions being deployed virtually everywhere which may constitute a threat to privacy.
Those are the three points I would like to raise. I think I've summarized them clearly. In any case, my brief is here, if you wish to use it.
I am ready to dialogue with you and to answer your questions at your convenience.