Madam Speaker, I was going to say that I am rising on Bill C-54, but since the House was prorogued by the government leader, we have to redo our homework today. We also have to rename this legislation Bill C-6.
In spite of the three and a half months the government had to prepare an appalling Speech from the Throne, it begged for three more weeks, and this of course led to all the bills dying on the order paper; this is unfortunate since the consideration of these bills was, for the most part, quite advanced in the House.
Bill C-6 is sponsored by the Minister of Industry, the good member for Ottawa South in the federal capital region. When we watch this minister act, we sometimes ask ourselves if his judgment is failing him.
This is the same minister who, a few weeks ago, said of Quebec's minister Bernard Landry that it was stupid of him to have met the mayor of Boisbriand, where GM's plant is located. He said “Since there is a good dialogue between us, I will help you keep GM's plant”, when everyone knows full well that 95% of Canadian automobile plants are in Ontario.
Quebec only has 5% of them, one out of 15, and the minister would like to close it down. The Minister of Industry would not even help us keep our plant and he has the nerve to introduce Bill C-6, which will violate Quebecers' intimacy and confidentiality.
The title of Bill C-6 reads in part “an act to support and promote electronic commerce”—everything is fine so far—“by protecting personal information that is collected, used”, etc.
Members can see how twisted and dishonest the government is. They changed the name of unemployment insurance for employment insurance. It means that you pay insurance policy and if your house burns down, the insurance company indemnifies you. In the same way, workers pay part of their wages to have protection against unemployment or lay off. The name of the plan was changed. Employment insurance was so much nicer!
The hon. member for Drummond knows perfectly well that only 42% of people who pay employment insurance premiums qualify for benefits when they lose their job. Why? Because eligibility criteria were hardened.
The minister of Industry tells us that he will protect the privacy of Canadians. If he treats the confidentiality of personal data the same way he treats Canadian workers, there are reasons to worry. The way he treated Bernard Landry, the vice premier of Quebec, shows that the man does not have an ounce of judgement.
The minister is so deprived of judgement that he acted unilaterally when he introduced his bill on personal data protection without waiting for the report of the very consultation committee he had created. I wonder how a man like him can be member of the cabinet. He created a consultation committee, but one week later, he went ahead without even waiting for the report of that committee. Isn't that bright?
There is even worse. On September 21st 1998, 13 months ago, he consulted the provincial ministers. A few days later, on October 1, he went ahead and introduced his bill, Bill C-54.
I am not the only one, and the Bloc Quebecois is not the only one to object to the way the minister is behaving. In Quebec, his critics are unanimous.
There is the government of Quebec, the Conseil du patronat, the CSN, the Chambre des notaires, Options consommateurs, the Barreau du Québec-of which the member for Brome—Missisquoi was president. There was a by-election after Mr. Peloquin, who represented this riding, died. The member who has replaced him said: “I will go to Ottawa to defend the interests of Quebecers.” He was then president of the Quebec Bar. Five years later, his former association says: “Bill C-6 is garbage, it should be thrown out.”
Worse yet, a group of constitutional experts said that Bill C-6 was in violation of the constitution. A little while ago, the member for Drummond said that in 1994 Quebec had passed a bill protecting personal information. In Quebec, we already have an act. A few years later, the federal government is getting ready to destroy, ruin, put the axe to something which is working well in Quebec.
We saw the same thing in the throne speech we heard two weeks ago. In Quebec we have a drug plan which is working well. The federal government now wants to create it own. Once again it is going to cause trouble in Quebec.
The Minister of Industry knows full well that in Quebec we have what we call civil law and in the rest of Canada they have common law. I would like to read section 3 of the Civil Code. It is very short:
“Every person is the holder of personality rights, such as the right to life
Everyone agrees
, the right to the inviolability and integrity of his person, and the right to the respect of his name, reputation
That is, not saying anything against someone
and privacy”.
This is section 3 of the Civil Code and it is from the latest volume that was just published.
Bill C-6 should be put in file 13, shelved and simply be cancelled. We, in the Bloc Quebecois, want that Bill-6 be simply withdrawn for a number of reasons.
First of all, the Minister of Industry has tabled it without consulting the provinces. The bill would interfere with provincial jurisdictions. It would force Quebec to go backwards with respect to the protection of personal information, as the hon. member for Drummond argued so well earlier, because its enforcement in Quebec would produce confusion and because it is lacking on the legal level.
Finally, it uses electronic commerce as an excuse to invade the civil right of Quebecers and of all Canadians.
In conclusion, I wished that the Prime Minister, the hon. member for Saint-Maurice, would try to make the minister see reason, although I sometimes question his intellectual abilities, as he demonstrated about a week and a half ago. If he is not able to do so, he should get rid of him as Minister of Industry and kick him out of the cabinet.