That particular provision is in PIPEDA, and much of the debate relates to some uncertainty regarding its interpretation. But ultimately, it allows the disclosure of personal information, without consent of the individual, to a law enforcement body or a national security body that has requested it, has identified its lawful authority to have it, and says that it's for the purposes of law enforcement or for enforcing a law.
Currently there's virtually no analogous restriction in the Privacy Act that we have before us. For example, the RCMP and Revenue Canada are both institutions of Her Majesty or the crown, which are indivisible; they're just organized in different sorts of ways. So information shared within one department or shared between two departments does not amount to a disclosure in the same way that under the private sector legislation it would be.
Under the current legislation, there is no necessity test or necessity requirement for that information. There's not even an obligation on the part of the law enforcement body to identify that it has the lawful authority to have that information, or even that it relates to a particular purpose.
It is my understanding that there are memoranda of understanding between government departments with respect to the sharing of that information, but those memoranda of understanding don't go through the checks and balances my colleague just referred to. They don't receive the same sort of scrutiny. The Privacy Act, as it's currently drafted, doesn't stand in the way of any of those sorts of practices.