Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join with my hon. colleagues from the Bloc Quebecois to strongly condemn Bill C-54, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act.
This bill does not accomplish what it set out to do, which is to protect citizens. Instead of a bill to really protect privacy in the private sector, in a technological environment that puts this fundamental right at risk, let us examine what the minister is proposing in this piece of legislation.
This is a flimsy and confused piece of legislation whose central feature is a schedule containing the Canadian Standards Association code without changes.
This legislation grants huge discretionary powers to the governor in council, but none whatsoever to the privacy commissioner; it focuses on e-commerce and places the fundamental notion of privacy on the back burner; it ignores the unique experience of Quebec in the area of protecting privacy in the private sector; finally, it could undermine the legislation in effect in the province of Quebec.
Before dealing directly with the shortcomings of the bill before us today, I would like to talk about the central concept of this bill, which is privacy, and to examine it in the Canadian and Quebec legislative context.
The right to privacy is a human right just like the right to equality and justice. The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year and to which Canada is a signatory, specifies that “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person” and that “No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation”.
In Canada, this protection is implied in sections 7 and 8 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Also, the Canadian government implemented in 1983 a Privacy Act that applies to more than 100 government organizations under its jurisdiction.
The federal government has since promised a framework legislation to ensure the private sector complies with the obligation of protecting privacy. Bill C-54 is the unfortunate result of that promise.
In Quebec, the right to privacy is explicitly recognized in the Quebec charter of human rights and freedoms and in the Quebec civil code. More importantly, the Quebec government is the only government in North America to have developed legislation governing personal information protection in the public sector in 1982 and in the private sector in 1994. Some experts even agree that the Quebec legislation applying to the private sector is reportedly one of the best in the world, which is remarkable.
I will point out some of the weaknesses in Bill C-54. This is a weak bill whose centrepiece is its schedule. Most provisions that will govern personal information protection are in the schedule to the bill. Moreover, this schedule is not the model code on personal information protection that was developed by the private sector and by consumers to serve as a framework for the protection of personal information on a voluntary basis.
By limiting himself to this text, the minister ignored the recommendations made by consumers and by privacy commissioners who recognized that the model code of the Canadian Standards Association was a good basis for reflection, but that it had to be reviewed before being incorporated into the legislation. The minister did not do so.
This undoubtedly shows that the minister has put economic values before social values, when this fundamental right is so fragile in the development of electronic commerce.
It is said also that this legislation gives tremendous discretion to the governor in council. Paragraph 27(2)( b ) gives the federal government the right to amend the act by order in council, without having to come back to parliament. Therefore, the act could easily be amended in accordance with the wishes of lobbyists representing large companies that contribute to the election funds of Canada's traditional political parties.
Another criticism we have is that this bill does not give any powers to the privacy commissioner. Despite the fact that the other Canadian provinces have followed Quebec's model by giving the commissioner the power to issue orders, the federal bill does the exact opposite.
The commissioner will not have the power to issue orders, which means that this act will not be easily accessible to consumers and will have no effect on businesses.
We say that this bill ignores Quebec's unique experience; therefore we cannot support it. It also ignores Quebec's unique experience with regard to the protection of personal information in the private sector.
I would like to give you a few examples: the objectives are better set out in the Quebec act, since it deals with the protection of privacy, irrespective of any commercial considerations. The Quebec act clearly covers all profit and non profit organizations, whereas the federal bill provides for the protection of personal information only in the context of commercial transactions.
The Quebec act provides that a group of persons may designate a representative in a common cause, but there is no equivalent provision in the federal bill.
On top of all these shortcomings, there is an even greater concern. The only guarantee Quebec has that it will exempted from this legislation is a timid statement by the Minister of Industry.
This mistrust is largely motivated by certain formal commitments to Quebec that the federal government has too often ignored or reneged on. For example, may I remind the government of the promises the Prime Minister made a few days before the 1995 referendum at the Verdun auditorium.
The issues are clear. For the Minister of Industry, the important thing is that Canada participate fully in the lightning fast progress of electronic commerce. Concerns expressed by Canadians with regard to their right to privacy are a minor consideration.
The Minister of Industry does not hesitate to take a centralizing position that, in many respects, goes against something that was very well done in Quebec and in the other provinces, something that he could have used as a model, particularly the Quebec model.
For all these reasons, the Bloc Quebecois is calling for the immediate withdrawal of Bill C-54.