Evidence of meeting #137 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was household.
A video is available from Parliament.
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Liberal
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Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, CPC
—personal...and I believe government should not have that power.
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Liberal
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David de Burgh Graham Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
Thank you.
To Mr. Albas' question, would households in any way be informed that their data could be collected?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
Yes, that's what we expect the institutions to tell their clients. We made that very clear to them in August. We asked them to say it was part of their process. We want to operate in a transparent way.
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Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
So it's not done in some magical background way. I appreciate that.
Would it be accurate to say that the 500,000 households collected for 350,000 samples used is to ensure that the data is properly blinded?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
Sorry, I didn't hear the first part of your question. Maybe the microphone is just a little farther away.
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Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
Or it's just me. That also happens.
Would it be accurate to say that the 500,000 households collected for only 350,000 used is to ensure that the data is properly blinded?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
That is simply to make sure that even the institutions that are providing us with that information don't know which records were actually used. It's noise, if you like, to further protect the privacy and confidentiality of—
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
Many times we use that methodology to mask, if you like, from the person providing that information, not knowing and being able to replicate that kind of analysis.
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Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
I understand.
To Mr. Lloyd's question, what's the legal basis of your ability to compel data without consent?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
Section 13 of the Statistics Act is the actual provision. That makes it very clear that, for statistical purposes only, we have the right to go to seek administrative—
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
That's been there since the inception of the Statistics Act—at least since 1971, if not even earlier than that.
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Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
Do statistical agencies in European countries have the power to compel data, in spite of the GDPR?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
Yes they do. In fact, the GDPR has a carve-out in various sections, for statistical purposes.
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Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
Mr. Lloyd asked this earlier. If someone sent you a letter saying they didn't want their data being used, would you even be able to identify the data as theirs to take it out?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
It would take a lot of gymnastics to find out whether their individual record or the household would be.... As I said, once the linkages are made, those linkages are put away in a vault, and we're dealing with the individual record in an anonymized fashion after that point.
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Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
Do the banks already have the information that you're requesting from them?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
Yes, they're the source of this information.
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Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
Can the banks use that information in any way and for any purpose other than to simply process the transactions?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
I couldn't speak to what the banks can or can't do. I don't know what their policies, procedures and processes are.
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Laurentides—Labelle, Lib.
That's fair.
You know that the businesses need the improved data that come out of this research. Could the banks themselves benefit from this aggregated data?
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Chief Statistician of Canada, Statistics Canada
Sure. The banks use this to expand their client base as well, and they obviously are impacted by inflation, CPI, interest rates and consumption patterns of households.
Even the formula on which a mortgage gets approved or denied is based on household leveraging and income and so on. Yes, the banks very much use this data. I think they will also benefit from the strengthened lower level of geography and more timely data.
