Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I'd like to thank everyone who organized this last-minute meeting and commend all of my fellow members for being here to discuss this very important issue.
I have found all the documents that were sent by the clerk, including Mr. Brassard's motion. Before I talk about that, I'd like to point out that we share some values. It goes without saying that all members of the House feel it's important that the privacy rights of Canadians be respected.
When I look at this story and the statements that have been made, including the Public Health Agency of Canada's statement and those of many of the people involved in this issue, it seems quite reasonable to me.
I see one difference between myself and Mr. Brassard. He stated that the government was tracking the cell phone information of Canadians.
Based on the department's statements, that is clearly not the case. What it requested was aggregated and de-identified data. It does not contain any personal identifiers.
So it doesn't make sense to say that Canadians are being tracked. That is not the case at all. The de-identified data received is just aggregated data, which is very useful to see if, generally speaking, Canadians are following public health guidelines like self-isolation to keep the virus from spreading. It's not true that a government agency took the data.
However, like Mr. Brassard, I believe most members of the House agree with and are very open to the idea of checking to see if that is true. We should do an investigation to reassure Canadians that this data is being used properly. If we can put aside partisan differences and truly investigate this, I feel that we can reach a broad consensus.
I am anxious, as I'm sure all my colleagues here are, to begin this work in a reasonable manner. We need to ask those responsible to appear before the committee so that we can do our work.
I also hope that we will do it without delay and not digress into partisan issues, to ensure that we can reveal the truth to all Canadians.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.