Information & Ethics Committee on Feb. 3rd, 2022

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

I'm bringing the meeting to order.

The motion that was adopted called for two separate panels, one with the minister and one with Dr. Tam and officials. The notice that went out had her here throughout. We're just trying to get contact. I'm not sure if it's technical or what the issue is.

I'd prefer to begin the meeting now with the minister. When we've had our hour with the minister then we will reset to a second panel with Dr. Tam.

Welcome to meeting number four of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(3)(h) and the motion adopted by the committee on Thursday, January 13, 2022, the committee is undertaking its study on collection and use of mobility data by the Government of Canada.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the House order of November 25, 2021. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application. The proceedings will be made available via the House of Commons website, and the webcast will always show the person speaking, rather than the entirety of the committee.

I'd like to take this opportunity to remind all of the participants at this meeting that screenshots or taking photos of your screen is not permitted.

Given the ongoing pandemic situation and in light of the recommendations from health authorities and the directive of the Board of Internal Economy on October 19, 2021, to remain healthy and safe, all those attending the meeting in person are to maintain a two-metre physical distance and must wear a non-medical mask when circulating in the room. It's highly recommended that the mask be worn at all times, including when seated—although I will not wear my mask while speaking. People must maintain proper hand hygiene by using the hand sanitizer provided at the room entrance. As the chair, I will be enforcing these measures for the duration of the meeting, and I thank members in advance for their co-operation.

To ensure an orderly meeting, I would like to outline a few rules to follow. Members and witnesses may speak in the official language of their choice. Interpretation services are available for this meeting. You have the choice, at the bottom of your screen, of either floor, English or French audio. If the interpretation is lost, please inform me immediately and we will ensure interpretation is properly restored before resuming the proceedings. The “raise hand” feature at the bottom of the screen can be used at any time if you wish to speak or alert the chair.

For members participating in person, proceed as you normally would when the whole committee is meeting in person in the committee room. Keep in mind the Board of Internal Economy's guidelines for mask and health protocols.

Before speaking, please wait until I recognize you by name. If you are on the video conference, please click the microphone icon to unmute yourself. If you are in the room, your microphone is controlled as normal by the proceedings and verification officer.

When speaking, please speak slowly and clearly. When you are not speaking, your mike should be on mute.

I will remind you that all comments by members and witnesses should be addressed through the chair. With regard to a speaking list, the committee clerk and I will do our best to maintain a consolidated speaking order for members, whether they are participating virtually or in person.

Now I would like to welcome our witnesses.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

I saw your hand there, but I wanted to try to get through the introductions and all of that.

Go ahead, Ms. Khalid.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I'm sorry, I just wanted to seek some clarification. Are we having two panels or are we having one single panel?

I see that all witnesses are here at this time. I'm just trying to sort out the timing piece of it for questioning.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

I don't see Dr. Tam...oh, she is here.

It had been my intention to separate and recalibrate the speaking order after the first hour, but if the committee would rather we run this all to the end, I can. My intent was to have our one hour and then recalibrate.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I think that would be a good reset, sir.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

Then that's what I will do.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

For our witnesses, we're very happy to have the Honourable Jean-Yves Duclos, Minister of Health, for the first hour, and we have with us from the Public Health Agency of Canada, Dr. Theresa Tam, chief public health officer.

Thank you Dr. Tam, for appearing today. We also have Kathy Thompson, executive vice-president and Christopher Allison, acting vice-president.

Minister, you have five minutes for your opening statement.

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for inviting me to speak to you today about the Government of Canada's commitment to both safeguarding the privacy of Canadians and working to continue to curb the spread of COVID‑19, thereby protecting everyone's health and safety.

The departmental officials kindly joining me today include Dr. Theresa Tam, who is the chief public health officer of Canada; Kathy Thompson, executive vice-president of the Public Health Agency of Canada; and Christopher Allison, acting vice-president, corporate data and surveillance branch of the Public Health Agency of Canada.

With lives on the line, the Government of Canada has always taken a range of actions to slow the spread of COVID-19, from implementing strict measures at the border to securing millions of vaccine doses to providing surge support to provinces and territories.

We have made and will continue to make informed decisions about policies and programs by reviewing information and analyzing all available data. By basing our decisions in this way on the best available evidence, expert advice and best practices abroad, we are better able to target our actions where they are most needed.

In the case of COVID‑19, reliable, timely and relevant public health data is informing our response to the pandemic and thus also protecting the health and safety of all citizens. The data we use comes from many sources. We are always looking for ways to leverage the most appropriate data to improve public health outcomes for Canadians.

The use of mobility data is not unique to Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada. Governments around the world, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Spain, Germany, Argentina, Brazil and the Netherlands, to name a few, are using this data to guide their pandemic response efforts.

In addition, several reputable international organizations have described the social utility that mobility data can offer in response to the pandemic. These include the United Nations, the World Bank, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the European Commission's Joint Research Centre.

In March 2020, the Public Health Agency of Canada began using mobility data to provide outbreak information and guide our response to the pandemic. In partnership with the Communications Research Centre of the Department of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, the agency used anonymized, de‑identified and aggregated location data from cell towers to support Canada's response to COVID‑19. This data was provided under a sole-source contract with the TELUS Data for Good program; the contract expired in October 2021.

The Public Health Agency of Canada also entered into a contract with BlueDot during the pandemic. This contract will expire on March 18, 2022.

On December 17, 2021, the Public Health Agency of Canada published a request for proposals on buyandsell.gc.ca, which opened a competitive process to continue this work.

I can assure all members of this committee that mobility data, both used and researched, is a valuable tool, which fully respects the privacy of all.

We also do not want to see any delays in the acquisition of this data, as this will and would impact the ongoing pandemic epidemiological monitoring activities. To be clear, the data sought [Technical difficulty—Editor] meet our requirements for aggregation, anonymity and privacy security and do not contain personal data that could identify individuals.

No personal data is obtained or provided.

This de-identified, anonymized, aggregated data is used to monitor the trajectory of the pandemic and how best to respond to it. This information helps governments at all levels determine how the public is responding to public health directives so that we can best tailor our approach and communications.

Mobility data allows us to examine—

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

I'm so sorry, Minister, but the motion called for a maximum five-minute introduction, and you're about half a minute over. I will get you to maybe just wrap up in a few seconds, if that's possible.

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

No, I want to respect the time that the committee thought was appropriate, so I'll stop now and turn back to you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

Okay, thank you very much. We will begin with six-minute question rounds, beginning with Mr. Brassard.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Before I start—if you can hold off on the time—I just want confirmation that, as is convention around here, the length of the question is the length of the time that it's given to be answered. Is that correct?

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

That's the customary practice.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

You'll hold us to it? Okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

All right, Mr. Brassard, go ahead for six minutes.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Thank you, Minister Duclos, for being here today. I want to say right off the top that we're here today, not because we don't believe that data is important, and that evidence-based data is important, to manage the pandemic. Every one of us around the table understands that information is important. We're here today because of an RFP that was produced by, as the minister said.... It was put out in December and brought to light the fact that the mobility data of Canadians was being collected, as the minister said, since March of 2020.

Now, let me tell you what this is about, and I'll ask the minister a question in a second.

This is about the fact that it was being done without the knowledge and without the consent of Canadians. That's what's so alarming about this. The other thing is that staff at the Privacy Commissioner's office—and I know that there have been, on a couple of occasions, pieces of information that are contrary or contradictory to each other—said that they had not been contacted about this practice being done, so there are conflicting reports on that.

Now, you can speak to anonymized and aggregated data all you want, but there are security and privacy experts, Mr. Chair, who have expressed sincere concern about the security measures and the protocols that were put in place in order to protect the privacy of Canadians and ensure that it isn't compromised. We are going to hear from experts as we move further into the study, who are going to talk to us about how easy it is to re-identify or de-identify that data for commercial purposes.

My question to the minister is this: Does he not understand the concern that has come to light as a result of this?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

First, thank you to our colleague Mr. Brassard for stating from the start that the use of science and the use of information has been key, not only to saving billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of jobs but also to saving tens of thousands of lives. The outcome of what we've done in the last 20 months.... I repeat: Using information, data and science has saved tens of thousands of lives in Canada. Compared to all other countries in the G7 except for Japan, our death rate is significantly lower. If we had followed the example of our friend at the southern border, we would have had 60,000 more people dying in Canada, so we can congratulate each other on those actions based on science and data.

The second thing we all absolutely agree on—and Mr. Brassard certainly stated that very clearly—is the absolute priority to protect the information of Canadians, and that's why de-identified, aggregated, anonymized data have been used, and 1.7 million Canadians over the last few months have been able to see that data on the web. It's been there since 2020. It was announced by the Prime Minister in March 2020. It was implemented in April 2020, and as of January, 1.7 million Canadians have been able to see that data on the web, so nothing is secret. Everything is transparent, fully science-based and saving lots of lives.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Mr. Duclos, can I ask why the Privacy Commissioner wasn't consulted on this practice before it started?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

The Privacy Commissioner was informed, and there was a conversation right at the start of the pandemic, in April 2020. Thereafter—

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

They were informed?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

—there has been a meeting twice a month with the Privacy Commissioner since. In April 2020, it was determined that the information that was being used was not private and was not confidential, following the regulations and the laws of the Government of Canada—

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Thank you, sir.

There are conflicting reports about the Privacy Commissioner's office not being consulted in advance of this information being put out there. In fact, PHAC officials said they went to security and privacy experts. Who did they use, if not the Privacy Commissioner, for that advice?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

The experts, the legal experts, of the Government of Canada determined early in the process, with the collaboration of the various other experts, including comments made and advice provided by the Office of the Privacy Commissioner, that this information was not private and therefore did not follow the Privacy Act. Despite that, biweekly meetings have been held with the Privacy Commissioner since April 2020, and continue to today.