Madam Speaker, I am pleased, on behalf of the Bloc Québécois, to speak to Bill C-37. Let me read the summary to this bill that amends the Telecommunications Act:
This enactment amends the Telecommunications Act to permit the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission to administer databases for the purpose of its power under section 41, namely the power to prohibit or regulate the use by any person of the telecommunications facilities of a Canadian carrier for the provision of unsolicited telecommunications to the extent that the Commission considers it necessary to prevent undue inconvenience or nuisance, giving due regard to freedom of expression.
The enactment also establishes an administrative monetary penalty for the contravention of prohibitions or requirements of the Commission under that section.
This bill follows polls conducted across Canada and Quebec. Indeed, an Environics poll mentioned that 79% of Canadians said that they supported a national do not call list.
For those who perhaps did not understand, the purpose of this bill is to allow Quebeckers and Canadians who so wish to exclude themselves from any telemarketing promotion. Whether through faxes, e-mail or telephone, we are inundated by telemarketing companies that want to sell us the best product in the world. This often has its disadvantages, causes a lot of communications, clogs our e-mail accounts or overwhelms us with paper.
The public wants to have a way of avoiding such solicitation and Bill C-37 would give it to them. The Bloc Québécois will of course be in favour of the principle, and we agree that Quebeckers ought not to have to put up with such calls and ought to have the possibility of adding their names to a do not call list to be administered by the CRTC, if they so desire.
Automatically, if we were on such a list, all companies would no longer be entitled to solicit us, on pain of some relatively severe penalties and fines. The penalty would be $1,500 in the case of an individual and $15,000 for a corporation. Obviously, the employer is responsible for the mandate he has entrusted to a designated person, or in other words the company is responsible for the actions of its employees, hence the heavy fines for failure to fulfill this obligation.
We do, however, question one specific reality. The CRTC has already admitted that it was not in a position to administer this program, and would need a sizeable budget to do so. We feel it should be required of the companies to provide part of their telemarketing profits to maintain this do not call list.
Moreover, the Canadian Marketing Association has already admitted that it would be easier for them if they knew in advance if people did not want to be called. This would reduce costs of staff, faxes and e-mail. Because of these savings, the industry would be prepared to meet the costs of such a system.
On the other hand, there is still one major question that remains if a registry is administered by the government. We just need to think back to the huge amounts of money swallowed up by the firearms registry. I realize that the industry will want to know the costs up front, so as not to get into the incredible overspending that occurred there, with a predicted $2 million cost that has now escalated to over $2 billion.
It is important for us as members of parliament to be able to determine the framework for this registry. Companies would have to make a reasonable contribution. More important than that, members of the public would have prompt responses to their decision to be put on this do not call list.
We also want various amendments to be made to the bill. It must set out exclusions, in other words, establish clear parameters in the legislation, not currently included with regard to the groups that would be excluded.
It must be understand that, if such a list is created, people could be on the do not call list for everything. Charity begins at home. The political parties have asked that individuals not be able to exclude themselves from getting communications we may send them.
Often, people get information from their MP. Since the members of the Bloc Québécois have a close relationship with the public, we regularly send out information explaining the work being done by the charming men and women in the Bloc Québécois who are dedicated to Quebec.
Obviously, we would hope that political parties will always be able to communicate with the public.
There are non-profit charitable organizations too. All too often, the only way for these organizations to obtain funding is by having a direct link with the public. They often send us requests for donations by mail or in some other way. Permission must be given so that charitable organizations can continue to correspond with Quebeckers, who are extremely generous, as we have demonstrated in the past and as we will continue to demonstrate whenever the need arises.
There are also companies that already have an established business connection with their clients. We would not want banks and phone companies—be it only the yellow pages—to be unable to communicate with businesspeople in order to sell advertising space. This concerns, above all, cases where there is a relationship with an existing client. We want a framework to allow businesses to be able to communicate with people with whom they have done business in the past without being penalized for their actions and for the way they do business with their clients.
If these principles were clearly set out in the legislation, if the protection were ensured at a reasonable cost—that is what I want and what the Bloc Québécois will do in its proposed amendments. We will make sure that there is a registry. We will also ensure that this registry allows all Quebeckers and Canadians—those who want to, of course—to opt out of marketing advertising, and that the businesses that have to pay are charged reasonable prices, that the registry has the government's support and that its management is not entrusted to private enterprise. This was requested by the Canadian Marketing Association, among others; otherwise, it would like asking the wolf to watch the sheep.
Hon. members will have gathered that what we want is an entity operating at arm's length from industry, supported by industry at reasonable costs known ahead of time, so that we do not end up with another gun registry and that groups already doing business with the public can continue doing business. We are thinking of charities, political parties, banks, telephone companies and other businesses already using means of telecommunication to contact their clients. They have to be able to continue. If this is provided in the bill, the Bloc Québécois will gladly support this bill, which will be very useful and will prevent Quebeckers from being harassed to get things they do not want.