Evidence of meeting #148 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was google.
A video is available from Parliament.
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
It's not a reflection of skill. It's a reflection of their advertising systems work very differently from ours and they could accommodate the requirements in a way that we simply could not.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
What if when you want to go post an advertisement, you go through that page, you post up your advertisement, and you just add a little box that says this is a political ad? Then you have your programmers program exactly like Mr. Erskine-Smith said, so it will delay that going up for 24 hours.
Why don't they do that? It seems like a pretty simple fix.
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
Simply because the way our advertisement systems work, the fix was not nearly as simple as it might seem on the surface. Again, these are extremely complex systems so that every single time you implement one change it actually has a cascade effect. After robust discussion over many months about the ability to implement these kinds of systems, basically it simply became clear we couldn't do it in time.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
It became clear, so you had a long discussion. Clearly when you had that discussion you came out with a timeline that was reasonable, right?
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
We were working towards the June 30 timeline, which is when the requirements—
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
And I got that. You said you couldn't meet that.
When you had this robust discussion you clearly said we looked at it all, we can't get it done in this time. You had a schedule that had to be done. What was the schedule date?
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
June 30 was the only scheduled date we were looking at because that's when the legal obligations came into effect.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
Let's say I've got to do a project and I've got to get it done by June 30. I say how do I get it done, I see the steps that need to be done, and I come up with a date, and I say can I meet that date or not?
I don't just say as an engineer we can't do June 30. They had to do some form of calculations and some form of projections. That's what I'm asking you. They clearly did that to say they can't meet this, so when they did these projections, what date did they come up with?
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
There wasn't a date because June 30 was the only date. It was the date when legal obligations came into force and if the system was not built and in place by then, we would not be in compliance with the law. Therefore, if it was—
Liberal
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
Simply by virtue of having looked at the work that would be required—
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
Okay, so they looked at the work that would be required and then they said it's a lot of work. I got that. They had to say how long that work's going to take if we start today. How long did they say that work would take?
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
The didn't give us that projection.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
I want to understand something. We said we need it done by June 30 and then they went and did some kind of projection that said they couldn't do it by June 30, but the projection didn't say when they could do it, it just said it couldn't be done. But they have to, then, say I need six months, seven months, 10 months, 10 years, and then say if I start today, I can make it. What was their projection date to get it done by?
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
I can't give you that information because it was a “can you do it by this?”
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
Even if they say can you do it by this...? Let's say I want you to build me a house and I want you to build it in 10 days. They say they did the calculations, they could only build it in 30 days. Okay fine, so if you start today, you've got 30 days.
You say I want to program something. It's really complicated.
I understand that, Mr. Kee, it's very complicated. So I do a calculation, I say I need seven months, and it says that you've got to get it done in six. It can't get done. I get that. But I want the seven months number, or the 10 days number. I want the number when they did the projections of when it can be done by. It's a simple question. They can't just say it can't be done, because then they didn't do the work.
Do you follow me or not?
Did they do a schedule to say when it could be done? They have to have done this to say it could not be done by this schedule.
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
I don't have the information. I can inquire.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
I'm not asking you to inquire only. I'm asking you to come back here and give us a specific date on the calculations that they did to say they could meet this date. Am I clear?
Liberal
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
I understand what you're asking. With respect to our ability to disclose it, because given the fact that it's an internal confidential engineering information—
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
I'm saying that I was not made aware of any kind of projected dates.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
I understand that you per se weren't made aware of it, but it exists. Are you going to disclose it or not? Is this some kind of secret that it takes...? Is this is part of the Google secrets?
Public Policy and Government Relations Counsel, Google Canada
Simply put, I cannot commit to the disclosure without having internal conversations first.