Public Safety Committee on March 31st, 2015

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I'll direct this to the officials, Mr. Chair.

Quoting from Mr. Therrien's letter:

We note that relevance is a much broader standard than that established elsewhere with respect to the collection of personal information. As mentioned, CSIS can only collect information where it's “strictly necessary” to report and advise the Government of Canada in relation to a defined threat. CSIS would seemingly have to reject information disclosed to it under a relevance test....

He's saying the bill is too broad.

Can any of the officials expand beyond this? I know he's talking about the CSIS Act to a certain extent, but does the bill as currently worded mean that more information can be shared than is currently the case?

[John Davies]

My response would be that the consequence of switching from “relevant” to “necessary” as the amendment proposes would put the many departments and agencies in government in an awkward position. They would be forced to become the national security experts to understand what is necessary before information is shared. That would definitely affect the usability of the act, perhaps even more so than the information sharing today.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Okay, so then what you're suggesting is that the word “relevant” in here is necessary in the bill for the other departments and agencies to be able to share the information.

[John Davies]

That's correct.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Okay, thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Mr. Garrison.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Thank you very much.

I thank Mr. Easter for drawing our attention to that specific section of the letter from Mr. Therrien. I think it's important to read in the record what the Privacy Commissioner says here:

The threshold for information sharing is of central importance to striking the right balance in the protection of privacy rights. Applying a relevant standard because it exposes the personal information of everyone would contribute greatly to society where national security agencies would have virtually limitless powers to monitor and profile ordinary Canadians.

That's a very strong warning from the Privacy Commissioner about changing the standard from “necessary” to “relevant”. He points out that the standard of “necessary“, as Mr. Easter mentioned, is the one established in section 12 of the CSIS Act itself, which the government has seen no reason to amend, otherwise it would included that act in this bill.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you very much.

Yes, Ms. James.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I just want to remind committee members again that we're talking about the proposed information sharing act and that the information that can be shared can only relate to the specific activity that undermines the sovereignty, security, and so on, of Canada. It's tying back to that initial thing, so it's not like all information. Again, it's tied specifically to the purpose of this act and the activities related to national security that would be relevant to another agency or body. I am just tying this back to bring into perspective the actual scope of the information that would be shared to begin with.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you very much.

We'll call for a vote now on amendment NDP-4.

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Thank you, colleagues.

We will now go to amendment PV-4, Ms. May.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

This amendment is directly related to the letter from the Privacy Commissioner. He wrote:

Equally problematic is that SCISA would authorize information sharing if “relevant” to the jurisdiction of the recipient institution, rather than “necessary” to its mandate or “proportional” to the national security objective to be achieved.

I've heard the comments to a similar amendment from Justice officials, and they say this would create a difficulty for the agencies, but I think that the words of our Privacy Commissioner should be taken very seriously here. The mandate of protecting privacy is a significant one, and the advice of the Privacy Commissioner is reflected in my amendment PV-4, that we would be able to protect privacy by changing “relevant” to “necessary”.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you, Ms. May.

Yes, Ms. James.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you.

I won't labour too much about this. This is very similar to the last one I just spoke to and, for the very same reasons, I will not be supporting this amendment.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you very much.

Okay, I call for a vote on PV-4.

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Okay, colleagues, we will now go to amendment NDP-5.

Mr. Garrison.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

We're staying in the same area of discussion about information sharing and, again, I'm working from the letter from the Privacy Commissioner. What this does is add a section that is in a sense a greater certainty section. What it calls for is that the government institutions that are sharing information have a procedure that ensures the relevance, reliability, and sufficiency of information. In other words, this is information about to be shared. Has it been checked to make sure it's true? Has it been checked to make sure that it's relevant? Has it been checked to make sure it's complete?

The cautionary tale we have here is the story of Maher Arar, whose information was not checked for relevance, reliability, and sufficiency, and which ended up in the torture of a Canadian in another country. So, again, it's like a for greater certainty clause. What it would do is enshrine in legislation the best practice, as the Privacy Commissioner recommends, to make sure that once your information is gathered and then is about to be shared, that it's only done so when it's relevant, reliable, and complete.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you, Mr. Garrison.

Mr. Norlock.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I believe that the security of Canada information sharing act would create clear authorities to share information. The manner in which this information is collected and used will continue to be governed by the receiving institutions' existing legal obligations and restrictions, including the Privacy Act's framework for the collection, use, disclosure, retention, and disposal of personal information by government departments and agencies.

Canadian would and should expect that if one branch of government is aware of a threat to their security, this information would be shared with other branches of government in order to protect Canadians. The legislation has robust safeguards built in to protect the privacy of Canadians. We are not going to privilege the rights of terrorists over the rights of Canadians, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Easter.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I'm not going to disagree with what Mr. Norlock said. I think what the amendment does is to bring more precision to the definition and the way information sharing is handled. There is a concern that with the broadening of information, some individual may get caught in the loop based on wrong information. If that information is shared—and it doesn't just relate to cases like Arar, which I'm quite familiar with—with the Canada Revenue Agency or whoever, the individual's reputation or credit rating could be undermined or destroyed.

All this amendment is asking for is the various governments, departments, and agencies to be absolutely sure that the information they are sharing is accurate and complete. I think that's a greater protection to society. I'll be supporting this amendment.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you.

We will now call for a vote on NDP amendment 5.

(Amendment negatived [See Minutes of Proceedings])

We are now going to move on to amendment GP-5.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

As my colleague, Mr. Garrison, noted a moment ago, we're still in the general area.

This is, again, in response to the fact that this bill doesn't adequately protect Canadians' privacy, to put it mildly. This amendment of mine would allow a government department to refuse to disclose personal information if that department felt there would be a risk to the individual who's information was being shared. It would allow the Privacy Commissioner to investigate any complaint about the sharing of personal information.

As it stands right now, this bill has no mechanism for investigating such complaints. The second part of my amendment deals with the potential to investigate complaints. The first part would allow a government agency to refuse to disclose information on the test of a reasonable expectation that it could threaten the safety of an individual or if the personal information were subject to solicitor-client privilege.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you very much, Ms. May.

Discussion, Mr. Norlock.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

I believe that the amendment is redundant and unnecessary since the new act does not create an obligation to share information. The institution retains that discretion to share or not to share information.

I think Canadians would expect that if one branch of government is aware of a threat to Canadians' security, that information would be shared with another branch of government to protect them. The legislation, as I mentioned before, has robust safeguards built in to protect the privacy of Canadians. I repeat that I am adamant, Mr. Chair, that we are not going to privilege the rights of terrorists over the rights of Canadians.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Chair.

Can I say that I did not suggest that we should ever—