Mr. George.
Evidence of meeting #56 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was problem.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #56 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was problem.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Director, Intellectual Property, Information and Technology Trade Policy Division, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
As I said, we're working. We're developing options. I am not—and I don't think my working group is—n a position to give you a timetable.
Director General, Marketplace Framework Policy Branch, Department of Industry
On the other hand, we will bring the options to the attention of our respective ministers, so we can't tell you next week or next month. We can't tell you exactly what the timetable is. Clearly, the work has progressed to a point where we are exploring options now. It is no longer just academic or theoretical discussion. We know there are pockets of possibilities. The question is how we move them forward.
So don't lose faith. This isn't going to be a perpetual studying group. It is complex. In order to be effective, a number of actions are required. They are not just federal actions. They also involve industry actions and international actions. We are trying to prepare some pockets like that in order for ministers to make a decision, and that's as much as we can tell you right now.
Director, Legislative and International Projects, Copyright Policy Branch, Department of Canadian Heritage
Speaking on behalf of the Department of Canadian Heritage, I can tell you that the camcording issue is taken extremely seriously. Our minister is aware of the issue. We know she wants to move on it as soon as she can. It's an important issue for her.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
Thank you, Mr. McTeague.
I'm going to take a few minutes, just to have a few questions for myself. I do want to indicate to members that there are votes at 5:45. If they feel they want to leave, I will not keep them here.
I have four questions I want to ask.
First of all, Mr. Sloan, you state in your presentation that currently there is no legislation that specifically identifies counterfeit goods themselves as prohibited, controlled, or regulated. Should there be such legislation?
Director, Investigations Division, Enforcement Branch, Canada Border Services Agency
You're asking for a personal opinion?
Director, Investigations Division, Enforcement Branch, Canada Border Services Agency
I didn't think we were supposed to give personal opinions, but let me say it this way—
Director, Investigations Division, Enforcement Branch, Canada Border Services Agency
Let me say it this way. The WCO, the World Customs Organization, has set up best practices, suggestions for customs administrations on how to deal with counterfeit goods, and that is part of their model of recommendations.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
Thank you.
My second question is for Ms. Bincoletto. I want to follow up on what Monsieur Vincent asked, because I don't think he actually got an answer. His question, as I understood it, concerned what is on page 3 of your presentation: “The OECD refers to the fact that close to 60 per cent of seizures originated from only 5 countries”. Then the countries are named.
What specific actions, if any, has Canada taken with respect to those five countries or the counterfeiting of goods in those areas?
Director General, Marketplace Framework Policy Branch, Department of Industry
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
From Industry Canada's perspective, obviously we're interested in the issue, but our intellectual property tools are not targeted to deal with that.
Conservative
Director, Intellectual Property, Information and Technology Trade Policy Division, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade
We have been engaged in sharing intelligence with other organizations, through the RCMP, Interpol, and other points. One thing we have been hearing back is that exporters are getting increasingly sophisticated in redirecting shipments through other countries, so the original source of the shipment is not evident.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
Let me ask you, if one of these five countries counterfeits this, what are we going to do about it?
Director, Intellectual Property, Information and Technology Trade Policy Division, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade
The first step in this country is that RIM has intellectual property rights, which they can—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
I understand Canada and the U.S., but for the five countries named in this presentation, what is Canada going to do about it?
Director, Intellectual Property, Information and Technology Trade Policy Division, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade
We have the domestic option of catching it at the border, and we're working internationally with others to try to turn off the problem overseas.
One of our problems is not if it's produced in China and shipped here. If it's produced and shipped to a third country, does the Canadian producer lose his market there without becoming aware that he's lost the market in the third country?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
Okay.
I want to move to a third issue. If I go into a movie and set up a little camcorder to record it—perhaps this is for you, Mr. Hansen, and you may think this is an unfair question—realistically, is anything going to happen to me for recording that movie?
Supt Ken Hansen
No, because as far as we're concerned, you haven't committed an offence at that point.
Director, Legislative and International Projects, Copyright Policy Branch, Department of Canadian Heritage
I do want to make a correction. It is possible for rights holders to take civil action for copies made in a theatre.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
Speaking plainly, as a simple-minded MP from Alberta, if I walk in, record a movie, and walk out, then the rights-holder is supposed to somehow find this out and take action against me. Realistically, nothing is going to happen to that individual.
Director General, Marketplace Framework Policy Branch, Department of Industry
Again, Ken mentioned that it's not a criminal offence. But if it were, do you believe that the RCMP is going to go into all the movie theatres as well? That's a resource issue, and it goes back to priorities. Do you focus on the aircraft or on video recording?
The question is if the data show that there is a societal harm--I'm not talking economic--this will bolster the ability of the RCMP to establish those priorities. Otherwise they have finite resources, and it becomes very difficult to choose where to focus those resources.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
Let me move to that.
Mr. Hansen, I don't know what page it is on, but I very much appreciate that you talk about the authorities that you have and do not have. This is very helpful for the committee.
The RCMP has no authority to seize criminal proceeds under the Copyright Act, the Trade-marks Act, or the Criminal Code.
From the RCMP's perspective, could you comment on what legislative changes you would recommend? I believe the government recently put in some additional resources with respect to white-collar crime. How much is it a resource issue and how much is it a legislation issue?
On the legislation side, what legislative changes are needed to give you the authority to act in these cases?
Supt Ken Hansen
In terms of the legislative changes, that's part of what the working group is doing. They've identified the gaps. What we don't have right now is the precise way to plug those gaps. Some of them are pretty self-evident; we can't seize the proceeds of crime. Change the Governor in Council order so we can, because that's what's stopping us under the Copyright Act right now. Some of them are not quite so self-evident. Something the working group has to work on is, how do we fill those gaps?
In terms of resources, the resources you're talking about that we received, I presume you're talking about the 1,000 positions. First, it's not 1,000 police officers. It wound up being 1,000 positions, of which about two-thirds were police officers and the rest wound up being technical support and so on. Those were not to handle new issues such as this. This is a relatively new issue. Those resources were to restore integrity to our program. In other words, they were to allow funding to fill positions that had either been deleted or kept vacant to provide funding for operations. We wouldn't even have the authority from Treasury Board to take those and create dedicated positions out of them.