Industry Committee on April 21st, 2015

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Sure. NDP-3 is the first vote. Shall that amendment stand?

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

PV-8 is the next one that we'll be voting on then.

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Next would be NDP-4.

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Next would be NDP-5.

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Next would be NDP-6.

Madam Borg.

[Charmaine Borg, NDP, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

I am not going to spend too much time on this. This is really the same amendment, aside from the fact that we have paragraph (d.2) rather than (d.1).

You have already heard what I had to say on this. I think this is an important amendment to ensure the protection of the privacy of Canadians.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Are there any other comments?

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Next is NDP-7.

[Charmaine Borg, NDP, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Through this amendment and with the words “reasonable grounds to believe” we intend to up the threshold. This is in line with previous amendments. I think that this threshold, as proposed by the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, would afford greater respect for Canadians' privacy.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

All those in favour of NDP-7?

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Next would be PV-10. It's Mr. Hyer, I believe.

[Bruce Hyer, Green, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

These amendments deal with provisions that would allow the disclosure of personal information to a person's next of kin or their representative. There have been some good arguments for it. However, we are proposing that it be deleted nonetheless, on the advice of the Canadian Bar Association's elder law and privacy and access law sections, for three reasons.

One, it's intended to apply to older adults and as such may be discriminatory. I'm getting closer to that every day.

Two, the list of people and organizations that may receive disclosure without consent is unnecessarily broad and unspecified.

Three, in particular, “next of kin or authorized representative” is problematic, as financial abusers of older adults are most often the next of kin or authorized representatives themselves.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Hyer.

Mr. Lake, would you like any of the officials to comment?

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

If they want to.

[John Clare]

I think Mr. Hyer explained the amendment.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

All right.

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Next is PV-12.

Mr. Hyer.

[Bruce Hyer, Green, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Thank you.

This amendment is responding to concerns by Michael Geist and what he called the “glaring omission” in PIPEDA, which is that organizations do not need to report on how many warrantless disclosures to the government they've made and they never need to notify the individual whose information has been shared. The number of requests made to telecoms is absolutely staggering—over a million requests, and 750,000 disclosures of personal information—and the majority of those are without court oversight or warrants.

First, the law should require organizations to publicly report on the number of disclosures that they have disclosed, in aggregate, every 90 days. Second, organizations should be required to notify affected individuals of that disclosure within some kind of reasonable time period.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Mr. Lake.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

I'll just get the officials to comment on the impact of that.

[Christopher Padfield, Director General, Digital Policy Branch, Department of Industry]

This would require all organizations covered by PIPEDA that make any disclosures to law enforcement, any government agency, or any investigative body, for that matter, to record all those exchanges and to notify individuals within 60 days and make a public report every quarter.

That's a significant administrative burden. This would cover every organization covered by the act, so every small business or what have you. Because of the broad nature of the proposed amendment, it would cover any interactions or any exchanges. Take something as simple as a police officer asking someone working in a doughnut shop about a customer who was recently in. The doughnut shop owner would require, under that circumstance, to record that type of information, keep a record of it, try to notify the individual whose information they gave out, and then every quarter report out on those kinds of exchanges.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Padfield.

Is there any further debate on PV-12?

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Those are all the amendments for clause 6.

(Clause 6 agreed to)

We now have a proposed new clause 6.1 in amendment NDP-8.

Madam Borg.

[Charmaine Borg, NDP, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mr. Chair, this amendment is related to NDP-1. It would be illogical to move it since NDP-1 has not been passed. And so, I will withdraw it.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you.

(On clause 7)

On NDP-9, we have Madam Borg.

[Charmaine Borg, NDP, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

The purpose of this amendment is to add the word “reasonable” to the word “necessary”, which was proposed. I think our witness Professor Levin had suggested that. It is a very simple amendment but it would ensure that people will act in a reasonable way when it comes to personal information. Once again, the purpose is to increase the thresholds.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Madam Borg.

Let's go to the officials.

[John Clare]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

To be clear, the language proposed in Bill S-4 is that the disclosure would need to be necessary to establish, manage, or terminate the employment relationship and the amendment would add “and reasonable”.

We've talked about the reasonableness threshold already and what that entails. The fact that subsection 5(3) of the act already provides this overall requirement that any collection, use, and disclosure be reasonable in the circumstances, the use of the term necessary was intended to establish a higher threshold than reasonable.

In other words, the collection, use, or disclosure of that specific personal information is required for the purpose. So it would only be information that is required to establish, manage, or terminate an employment relationship. It wouldn't include any other information in the context of someone's employment.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Clare.

Is there any other discussion on NDP-9?

(Amendment negatived)

NDP-10, Madam Borg.

[Charmaine Borg, NDP, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

This is in my opinion no doubt the most important amendment I will move today. In fact, this amendment ensures greater transparency. If there have to be exceptions in PIPEDA with regard to the sharing of information without consent, I think it would be essential that there be transparency and that there be a mechanism so that Canadians know how often this happens.

The acting Privacy Commissioner said that 1.2 million requests were submitted to organizations for personal information without consent and without warrants. I know that people are worried because there are gaps and there has been abuse. That is very clear. The acting commissioner said that there was a lack of transparency and that there were no means to oblige the organizations to divulge this information. Even government agencies are not obliged to reveal how often these requests are submitted to them. We must thus ensure that there is no abuse. I think this is primordial.

The amendment specifically asks that a report be published on this. The point is not necessarily to inform individuals, but we can kill two birds with one stone because we will in this way publicly divulge how often this has occurred. I think this is what Canadians are asking for. It is in my opinion very important that this amendment be brought forward today so that the privacy of Canadians will be respected.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Mr. Lake.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

We heard from a lot of witnesses on this, and if anything the witnesses reinforced for me that we found the balance in the legislation that we brought forward. We heard witnesses calling for more and we heard witnesses calling for less. It seems we have a very balanced approach in the legislation. I will of course allow the witnesses to testify to this if they have anything to add.

[Christopher Padfield]

The amendment is drafted to cover more than just the disclosures. It covers the collection, use, and disclosure any time anyone collected any personal information of any kind, any time we use any kind of personal information, and any time it's disclosed. All three of those things would be covered by the amendment. It's a very broad capturing for those corporate reports. Companies would be required to report any information of any kind.

Again, this one where it's quite broadly placed would include journalists. They would have to make quarterly reports on when they have collected, used, and disclosed the information.