There are two things here. For minister's offices and the Prime Minister's Office, the Privacy Act is the correct instrument to regulate the handling of personal information.
When you look at the coverage of the access and privacy acts, I would come at it from the perspective that there's currently a list of departments and institutions that are part of the executive branch that are covered by the Privacy Act. As a general rule, the entire executive branch and all government institutions should be covered by the Privacy Act, including minister's offices and the Prime Minister's Office.
On the question of political parties, I'm coming to that conclusion because coverage is an issue that is before you, so who should be covered who is not covered? There has been a lot of discussion and concern about the fact that the collection and use of personal information by political parties is currently unregulated. Canada is one of the few countries in which this is so. Canada and the U.S. are the outliers here. In most other countries, the personal information managed and collected by political parties is regulated in some manner by law.
I don't think the Privacy Act is the right instrument because it's essentially designed for the management of information by a government department. Many of its provisions are drafted with that in mind and political parties do not operate in the same context.
However, I will take this opportunity to say that in terms of coverage, if there's one institution where there is a gap in terms of regulation, and that needs to be remedied, it would be political parties.