Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques for her question. She is asking an extremely important question about the rights of citizens and consumers with regard to confidential information.
I am not sure the bill deals specifically with the question of privacy provisions but I do know that the protections under the Privacy Act are quite demanding.
The member might recall problems that occurred when one of the banks was processing data in the United States and it could have come under the purview of the Patriot Act. I have been told on pretty good authority that the problem has been rectified. However it is a constant challenge. We do know there is a lot of identity fraud, people purporting to be someone they are not. This is why when we go to banking machines we are told to protect our code, but even with all of that people will try to break that system such as computer hackers.
We should be quite proud of the strength and the progressiveness of the banking sector in Canada. When it comes to building firewalls and protecting data, generally they do a very good job, but it is a work in progress for which, I suspect, they need to be constantly vigilant.
Protecting the privacy of Canadians is paramount and I am not sure this legislation deals with that specifically. The member is right, it is a very important point and something the government is seized with as well.