Thank you, Mr. Chair. We appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today.
My name is Joanne De Laurentiis. I'm president and CEO of the Investment Funds Institute of Canada. I'm joined by Paul Vaillancourt, who is an independent financial consultant who runs his own successful business here in Ottawa. We will share our comments this afternoon.
The Investment Funds Institute of Canada is the national association of the Canadian investment funds industry. Like Paul, individuals representing our members work in almost every town and city across Canada. IFIC's mutual fund manager members manage over $560 billion in mutual fund assets, and 70% of these assets are held in retirement saving vehicles and are helping Canadians build their wealth.
We believe the clauses in Bill C-27 that combat and punish illegal and harmful activities and that damage the trust surrounding electronic commerce are necessary. We support the recommendations in clauses 7 and 8 regarding the prohibition of the altering of transmission data and the unauthorized installation of computer programs on another's computer. We also support the proposed amendments to the Competition Act to prohibit misleading commercial e-mails and amendments to PIPEDA regarding the use of e-mails collected through selected computer programs.
We are here to encourage you to better balance the protection of individuals and businesses from unwanted e-mails while still allowing responsible communications by legitimate businesses to their potential clients and customers. We think this can be accomplished with several simple amendments.