Information & Ethics Committee on Oct. 30th, 2018

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Okay.

[Michael Fenrick]

Mr. Baylis, I'd just like to interject with one more point. Of course, the list of electors that we receive is subject to the Canada Elections Act, and that's the primary point, I think, for all three parties in terms of the information that we collect. There are penalties, quite steep and serious penalties, for using that information right now.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

That's the list of electors that you've collected. I understood that. However, then you've added stuff through your door knocking and through your phone calls—that this person likes pizza and that person likes hamburgers—that helps you to sell them your political views. That's the data that I'm talking about. You're saying that you'd be comfortable if we did not allow you to share the data that you're collecting.

[Trevor Bailey]

As I said, I think that's a good suggestion, and if it fits with our policy, yes.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Mr. Fenrick, do you have thoughts on that?

[Michael Fenrick]

I don't actually have a position on that right now.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Okay.

I want to follow up on what Mr. Angus was asking about: micro-targeting. Right now we might collect people's religious leanings, people's ethnicities, what languages they speak and things of that nature. Do you see a limit to how far we should allow political parties to go?

If we pick up, for example, that a person is part of a hate group or a person has some sorts of views that are not acceptable in general society, you might be able to use that view. We see this in politics, so it's not hypothetical. We see this and it's used to push them a certain way. That's part of what we found out in this study and in other places.

How should we have parameters of what we should and should not allow you to do and collect? Is there anything that we should not allow you to collect?

[Jesse Calvert]

The information we collect about individuals is the information that they give us, and that seems like a good place to start....

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Okay, if someone says, “I hate this ethnic group”, are you going to collect that data?

[Jesse Calvert]

By hearing it, we would have it. That's certainly not information that's—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

The person who heard it heard it, but did you put it in your database as a data point?

[Jesse Calvert]

I don't think so. I don't think we would be interested in that.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Then you didn't collect it. I'm asking you whether we should put parameters around what you can and cannot collect.

[Jesse Calvert]

I actually haven't thought too much about that question. I think it's a good question. We might be able to get back to you on more specifics about how—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Does your code of conduct, code of ethics, have any limits on that?

[Jesse Calvert]

I'd have to look into it. I don't believe so.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

Thank you, Mr. Baylis.

Next up for five minutes we have Monsieur Gourde.

[Jacques Gourde, Conservative, Lévis—Lotbinière, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being here this morning.

I have no doubt as to the sincerity of your remarks today. From my 30 or so years in politics, I can tell you that, even though we are now living in the computer age, we've learned absolutely nothing. Forty years ago, I was working with people who were 50 and 60 years old at the time and who had been in the field for 40 years. When election time came around, there were lists of electors with people's phone numbers, and they were the right phone numbers. Back then, it was easy. Everyone had phone books and they were very thick. When we received the list of electors with people's names and addresses, we could look them up in the phone book. In many cases, a single household would have four, five or six voters, all with the same telephone number. That's no longer the case today.

Unfortunately, the number of land lines has dropped significantly every single year since I entered federal politics, and this will be my fifth election. Today, only 30% to 40% of people have land lines. All the rest of voters have cell phones. We don't have access to cell phone numbers, making it increasingly difficult to reach all voters. One riding can have 90,000 voters. We can knock on 10,000 doors, but let's not kid ourselves, we also have to spend time reaching out to people by phone.

Nowadays, we hear a lot about profiling. We assume people vote a certain way because they have certain views, but we can't just call them on the phone. We assume they think a certain way and we use social networks like Facebook to reach those people because we can't talk to them otherwise.

Do you think we should be allowed access to the cell phone numbers of people on the list of electors? It's fairly easy to get the phone numbers of people with land lines, but we can't get cell phone numbers, and the issue is only going to get worse. Is that something we should ask for, as lawmakers?

My question is for all three of you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

We'll start off with Mr. Calvert.

[Jesse Calvert]

I'm sorry, you're asking whether we think that political parties should be given cellphone numbers through, say, the permanent electors list that Elections Canada generates. Is that your question?

[Jacques Gourde, Conservative, Lévis—Lotbinière, QC]

Yes, that's what I was asking.

We can get people's land line numbers from online directories—since actual phone books have all but disappeared—but cell phone numbers are considered confidential and we don't have access to them. Not being able to communicate with voters is problematic in many ways, and it's getting worse every year. As people die, the proportion of land lines drops between 1% and 5% a year. Young people own only cell phones. In 15 years, just 20% of the population will be accessible to us by phone.

Should we raise the red flag to say that it's time to do something about this situation? It's a genuine problem, after all.

[Jesse Calvert]

Thank you for the clarification.

I think that society continues to change and technology continues to change, and the way we do things has to also continue to change. The goal of a political party, or at least our political party, the New Democratic Party, is to engage Canadians in meaningful conversations. Anything that, say, Elections Canada was able to provide to us to allow us to do a better job at that, we would generally be supportive of.

[Michael Fenrick]

On behalf of the Liberal Party of Canada as well, part of the reason that we were excited to have this opportunity today was to discuss how it is not just that we're going to protect Canadians' privacy, which is obviously of critical importance, but also how we are going to meaningfully engage Canadians in the 21st century in order to have those discussions. I'm not sure of the logistics around the particular cellphone issue, but I am aware of the statistics that you have cited to the committee here today.

I do think it's of concern that it is more difficult every year for political parties to actually have discussions, not just with their supporters but with all Canadians, in order to provide an opportunity to actually understand what the electorate is looking for, which is why I think all of the committee members are in this business.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

We're actually out of time so just a brief response, maybe 10 seconds or less, if you can.

[Trevor Bailey]

You described the situation very well.

It's more access to data for us that can be provided to us legislatively by Elections Canada. We put a lot of effort into acquiring that information, so if it can be provided to us we would welcome it.