Industry Committee on Nov. 9th, 2023

[Carole Piovesan]

If you look at the draft of AIDA, much of it is an accountability framework. It is a series of assessments with accountability that overlays when that high-impact trigger is reached.

I agree that a flexible approach is useful in a context in which you have so much changing so quickly, so I support that flexible approach, recognizing, as I said in my opening remarks, that there are some distinct holes in this particular draft.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Thank you, Chair. I think I'm good.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

Thank you, Mr. Turnbull.

We now go to Mr. Lemire.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My question is for Mr. Lamb, but the other witnesses can comment if they wish.

A few weeks ago in Trois‑Rivières, the Bloc Québécois hosted a conference on AI. A number of people expressed concern that the copyright of creators would not be adequately protected under AIDA. That is vitally important in Quebec, where cultural and linguistic preservation are more timely than ever in the face of assimilation and the decline of the French language.

Mr. Lamb, how could AIDA be specifically amended to better protect the copyright of creators, given the particular importance of preserving Quebec's culture and language?

[Scott Lamb]

I think that one thing that has been discussed at length and is an important discussion is bias. The legislation and the discussion have moved around issues of bias to ensure cultural protection. Bias in any way in that regard in the legislation should strive not to prejudice any group, sector or community in our society. Of course, French language rights are very important and should be understood and protected.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

If creators do not have adequate copyright protection, how might cultural and linguistic creativity suffer, especially in Quebec? What measures could be taken to mitigate the potential impact?

[Scott Lamb]

Are you speaking with respect to the privacy legislation or the artificial intelligence legislation?

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I'm interested in your comments on both. I'm especially interested in the AI angle, but also with respect to data protection.

[Scott Lamb]

I didn't get the translation for that, unfortunately.

[Carole Piovesan]

It's particularly in the context of the artificial intelligence act, but it can be in whatever context you want.

[Scott Lamb]

Again, I think that the issues are issues of bias. I think that's where your concern should be in ensuring that French language rights are protected and that artificial intelligence isn't in any way biasing French as a common language of discourse in our country.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

How could AIDA draw on international best practices to better protect copyright, while encouraging AI innovation?

[Scott Lamb]

Innovation, as you saw from my remarks, and research and development are fundamental. We have to be very careful as we move forward with this legislation.

My remarks were to carefully distinguish between research and development and artificial intelligence that's rolled out in a public domain or for consumer purposes. While I agree with my colleague that the benefits are enormous for the public, we also have to be very careful that, in restricting, managing and regulating how that is rolled out to the public, we do not foreclose leading-edge research into artificial intelligence.

Again, I would emphasize that this is not a pleasant world we live in at times. The stakes for who has the commanding heights of artificial intelligence are extraordinarily high. We should do nothing to restrict that, and we should make sure that our country and our allies are at the front end of that research and development.

We want to protect our public from the pernicious effects of artificial intelligence.

You raised some issues of language rights and bias. That's a very important discussion to make sure that we protect our public, maintain our democratic values and ensure that the fundamental issue of privacy is preserved in our country.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you.

Do you have anything to add, Ms. Piovesan?

[Carole Piovesan]

I have two points to make in response to what you said.

The first is that generative artificial intelligence, generative AI, is the nature of artificial intelligence that we see today through ChatGPT and other types of tools. That is typically considered a general purpose AI, for which, in the letter of the minister, an amendment is proposed to be defined as high-impact systems, which means that it would fall within the governance structure of AIDA. Arguably, it would serve to protect the rights of authors and content creators, because there would be the necessity to govern the use of those systems.

My colleague, Mr. Joli-Coeur, disputed that it should, in fact, be governed separately. I have sympathy for his positions. We are seeing measures that could be put in place to mitigate some of the risks coming up more and more—content provenance and being able to trace watermark content in its original form so we can understand if that content has ever been manipulated or changed in any way that could be problematic to an author or to a content creator when they put their systems online.

In addition, through an entirely separate process, we are undergoing a Copyright Act review, so these types of conversations are very much alive in Canada and in other jurisdictions as well.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I have just a few seconds left, Mr. Jarvie, so you can have them.

[Alexander Jarvie]

I just want to add that this is one of the reasons I think AIDA should address the concerns of groups, the harms that could be effected against groups or communities. This is a great example.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Absolutely.

I see Mr. Young nodding. Did you have something to add?

[David Young]

No, not really.

I'd just like to make one sort of general comment. My expertise hasn't focused on AIDA. I've read it. I'm familiar with the European legislation. People have mentioned that it has holes and that it's like part of the EU legislation—part of it. It has the framework, but what it doesn't have.... I apologize; I'm not up to date on the minister's letter on this. What the European legislation does is define levels of risk, right down to no risk, right? They have something like four levels. Why don't we have that? It makes sense.

It's like we're operating with one hand behind our back to build this. If I were going to say...and I'm not coming with any opinions on what to do. I think it's a huge quandary for this committee and Parliament as to what to do with AIDA. There's no question about that. It just strikes me: Why aren't we there? I mean, if you read the EU act, which isn't in force.... It's still in the process. There's quite a bit of process to get it into law, but it's there. It's the act. You read it and you see these levels, and they have responses and levels of oversight and care. We should be doing that.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you very much.

I have to say that, as a legislator, I really appreciate today's discussion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr. Masse.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

To continue, I think it was Mr. Young who mentioned Bill C-27 and Quebec's Law 25. Can you give us a little more background as to why it's important to have consistency there?

Also, potentially, could we inadvertently cause some damage to Quebec with regard to this bill if we don't handle this properly? I'm worried. We're looking at neutrality for Quebec at the very least, I think, as an objective, but I'm also worried about inadvertently damaging their system right now.

Perhaps you could start us off on that conversation.

[David Young]

Sure. The level of damage that I would address is confusion if we don't align them—confusion for Quebeckers, primarily, if we end up with some different standards. This actually applies elsewhere than the categories of de-identified information. Anonymized information is the main focus. It just makes sense to align across the country.

There are two points. I mean, really, I guess I can describe it by “two points”.

Data is collected by primarily national cross-Canada organizations intermingling the data. Are we going to come up with some rules that just somehow hive off Quebec data for these cross-nationals? That's not going to happen. It's going to be intermingled. Yes, there are possible systems that could do it and put in rules, but it doesn't make sense. I'll rephrase that. Organizations will not want to have to come up with a separate category of information for Quebec, different from the rest of the country. It's not exceptional to basically have the same rules apply. I'm talking about anonymized information.

The other thing is that I have spent a lot of my career advising marketers. I know that they don't like to say, “Well, actually, our higher standard rules apply just to Quebec residents.” How will that happen? It's not going to happen. You're going to have those companies saying, “No, we're going to the highest standard.”

Thirdly, I will say that I think Law 25 is going to inform privacy standards across the country de facto, and it is informing this committee and what we're doing here. That, hopefully—

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

At the end of the day, you're saying that if we don't have that alignment, there are two major injurious sections. One will be on the privacy of individuals and what they have to go through, and then the other will be on economic consequences from companies not wanting to do business, set up shop or provide products and services in Quebec. Is that basically what—

[David Young]

I don't buy into that, actually. I heard it at a conference today—that if we don't get these rules right, nobody is going to come to Canada. That isn't going to happen. Marketers know that.