Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise after my colleague in the New Democratic Party and tell him that he is not alone. His motion may be the only one in Group No. 3, but he will not be the only one supporting it, far from it.
I must first say that, after asking parliamentarians to support a number of motions I introduced earlier, in order to emphasize the importance that the House and the government must attach to privacy, I was disappointed that these motions did not receive all the support I had hoped.
Motion No. 7, however, introduced by my colleague, the member for Sydney—Victoria, addresses the same principle, but from another angle that will perhaps appeal more naturally to some of the members sitting to the right of me, and perhaps even further right than that politically.
The motion calls for increasing from two to seven years the maximum sentence for individuals contravening certain provisions of the bill designed to try to keep information collected as secret as possible.
We in the Bloc Quebecois attach considerable importance to the protection of privacy. When it comes to anything to do with information, the Bloc Quebecois takes an extremely hard line. We were, for example, in favour of stiffer penalties for the destruction of information that should be accessible under access legislation. We want the greatest possible transparency, but we do not want this transparency to enable some individuals to obtain information to which they have absolutely no right.
It is important to remember that DNA reveals to us an individual's deepest secrets, his or her hair colour, and certain physical characteristics. For all we know, a few years from now, technology may make it possible to discover someone's personality. This is a very powerful tool, and it is essential that people be discouraged from using DNA data for purposes other than those set out in the bill.
It is therefore with pleasure that I support the motion introduced by my colleague, the member for Sydney—Victoria. I hope that other members to my right and across the way will do the same, in order to underscore the fundamental importance of the protection of privacy in this bill.