Evidence of meeting #91 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was data.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
I had two, but I'll start with one.
Proposed section 35 says that an organization may disclose an individual’s personal information without their knowledge or consent if it is collected for statistical purposes or research.
It doesn't identify by whom, but it seems to me to be a fairly open-ended breach of consent being that it can be given to the government for statistical reasons or to a university for statistical reasons or research reasons without going back, and it's personal information.
Could you comment on that, Mr. Therrien and Mr. Fraser?
Partner, McInnes Cooper, As an Individual
There are already provisions that are similar to that in PIPEDA and other statutes, but with more safeguards that would a require privacy impact assessment, a research ethics approval, or reporting to the Privacy Commissioner. There are also provisions in the Statistics Act that allow Statistics Canada to compel that sort of information.
I share your concern when it comes to something that's so open-ended. One of the things that's a hallmark of good privacy accountability is an analysis and a determination of the inherent privacy risks and the mitigation steps that we can take. One thing I would also notice is that so many of those provisions are discretionary. They don't require the organization to disclose it; they permit it to do so.
Conservative
Lawyer and Former Privacy Commissioner of Canada, As an Individual
I would extend your question to a discussion that occurred a few minutes ago. I think here we're into the use of data for social good. It's an example of the use of data for social good. As Mr. Fraser said, there are similar provisions in the current act. I think these are good provisions, provided that we really deal with the social good.
Proposed section 39 otherwise defines “socially beneficial purposes”. Some of my colleagues have remarked that socially beneficial purposes are limited to disclosure to public entities. They make the point that private sector entities should be able to benefit from this. It's not inconceivable, but we need to be careful to disclose information to business for socially beneficial purposes. There's—
Conservative
Lawyer and Former Privacy Commissioner of Canada, As an Individual
No. Proposed section 39 does. That's why I expanded your question to deal with social good and included proposed section 35, statistical purposes, and proposed section 39, socially beneficial purposes. I would say that legitimate interests are the true domain of corporations. I think that latitude given to companies can be defensible. Socially beneficial purposes are currently limited to public entities, with the possibility of prescribing, by regulations, other entities, which I assume means potentially—
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
But it doesn't say that in proposed section 35. In proposed section 35, it's open to anybody.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
It's any organization. It doesn't restrict it to social good. It doesn't have any restrictions whatsoever. It just says that an organization, if they decide to, can breach your personal information, do it without consent, and provide it to other people for “statistical purposes” or “research purposes”. That's to anybody. It doesn't say to business. It doesn't say to universities. It doesn't say to the government. It's available to anybody, under this.
Lawyer and Former Privacy Commissioner of Canada, As an Individual
This has been interpreted, so far, as essentially in the domain of public interest statistical purposes, as opposed to purely commercial.
October 24th, 2023 / 5:30 p.m.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
But businesses do research. Biotech firms do research.
Lawyer and Former Privacy Commissioner of Canada, As an Individual
I understand.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Joël Lightbound
Thank you very much.
That's all the time we have for this meeting.
I want to thank all the witnesses for taking the time to come and meet with us today. This has been a really interesting discussion.
I thank the support staff, the interpreters and the analysts.
The meeting is adjourned.
