Evidence of meeting #4 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was complaints.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:20 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
Are you aware of the information retained in those chips?
5:20 p.m.
Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
No. I imagine there are unique identifiers because it has to be activated with a PIN, which makes it possible to confirm that it's indeed the person to whom the card was issued who is using it, as is done in Europe.
5:20 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
As regards the nature of the information, you're not aware of anything.
5:25 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
In your appearance, you said that Canada didn't have legislation on e-crime or on e-mail or identity theft, although the Justice Committee has addressed that issue. Before the election, a study was done on the former Bill C-27.
You added that there was no legislation on the reporting of privacy risks. The worst of all—you win the prize—is that we have no idea of the number of countries with which we exchange personal information, nor are we at all aware of the scope of the personal information that is transmitted to other countries.
5:25 p.m.
Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
I'm saying that, personally, I don't know, but I imagine the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade has an idea. There's also a publication entitled “Info Source”, which is a list of all government data bases. In my opinion, “Info Source” doesn't provide us with very useful information. It's simply a list of which we don't understand much.
I'm sure that someone in the federal government knows with whom we're exchanging personal information, country by country, but it's not me.
5:25 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
Do you think the Privacy Commissioner may be one of the designated persons who should know, with regard to the transborder transmission of personal information, with which countries were doing business?
5:25 p.m.
Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
Certainly, but I suggested in the report I prepared on the need to improve the Privacy Act that these kinds of agreements should be submitted to Parliament.
5:25 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
But nothing is currently submitted to Parliament, if I understand correctly.
5:25 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
Data transfers are made with other countries, and parliamentarians—
5:25 p.m.
Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
They are made party to party between the officials responsible for the files.
5:25 p.m.
Bloc
5:25 p.m.
Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
No, Parliament isn't aware of it.
5:25 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
This is personal information on citizens living in a country where they have rights.
5:25 p.m.
Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
Exactly, the two countries can enter into a party-to-party agreement to exchange certain lists of personal information, which is perfectly legal under the present act, and there is no obligation to publish details.
5:25 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
Nor is anyone required to publish and disclose.
I have another question, Ms. Stoddart, but it's nearly 5:30 p.m. So I believe I'm going to request adjournment.
February 23rd, 2009 / 5:25 p.m.
Liberal
Michelle Simson Liberal Scarborough Southwest, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Ms. Stoddart.
This has been a real education for me. I was newly elected in October, and I have done quite a bit of reading on this subject, but nothing quite prepared me for what I heard today.
I know you're just the messenger—and I appreciate the message—but I'm hearing that we're dealing with a 25-year-old act, we have civil servants who are undertrained, and it's your opinion that we're perhaps above average in some respect. That doesn't quite jibe with me, and I'm really concerned about your human resources position.
You said you're up to about 161 employees. Based on the current staffing levels, approximately how long will it take for that backlog to dissipate?
5:25 p.m.
Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
We are calculating right now, if all things stay equal in our model, we should be able to eliminate that backlog by the first quarter of 2010.
5:25 p.m.
Liberal
Michelle Simson Liberal Scarborough Southwest, ON
Based on the fact that we're dealing with extremely old legislation and technology is racing forward, do you know the approximate increase and the year-over-year increase in the number of complaints? Will the current staff levels be able to keep those in check?
And as a back-up question, how are the complaints prioritized--as you receive them, or are they reviewed and then some of the more egregious ones dealt with sooner? I'm not familiar with your process.
5:25 p.m.
Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
Thank you for that question.
In fact we're redoing our process, because we're trying to push the limits of the present legislation a bit. We don't have a lot of discretion, but we do have some. Given the number of privacy challenges for Canadians, we want to make sure we get to the most significant ones first, while not neglecting any and maybe giving a shorter treatment time to the ones that may be less significant in terms of a general privacy policy.
As for the human resources, I'm very grateful for the human resources that we have now and I'm very happy that we've been able to hire some very able people. However, as you know, Ottawa is a hot market for talented people, and there is a challenge in retaining very bright people in a small agency where the opportunities for promotion are not those of a large department. That's just one of the challenges I have to deal with.
Another challenge in terms of human resources is that it's not just the numbers. I think the number I have is fine; it's training them. It's also being able to classify them within a very rigid system of classification that dates back several generations, because you're looking at people who have radically new skill sets to understand the new technologies and then translate them into what should be government action.
