Mr. Speaker, I am very honoured to rise today to speak to Bill C-475, which I will support at second reading.
First, I would like to speak to the work ethic of my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville when it comes to digital issues. As the digital issues critic, my colleague has done a lot of work on a policy to better protect our personal information on the Internet. I appreciate the work she has done.
My colleague held a number of public consultations, which is important to note with this bill, since it has been well received by the public. If there is one thing that is very important and that the NDP puts a lot of emphasis on, it is public consultation. I know that most of my colleagues have held their own consultations in recent weeks and months on several issues that affect the Canadian public.
Digital issues, and privacy in particular, are extremely important issues that affect all Canadians. Later on in my speech I will talk about what the people of Alfred-Pellan, in Laval, have told me. It shows a good work ethic to consult the public, and we can create excellent bills that reflect what the public wants.
It is sad to see that, unfortunately, the federal government is not consulting the public about digital issues and our privacy. This issue is very topical and we must take it seriously. That is why public consultation is so important.
Bill C-475 would create modern protections for an issue for which it is extremely difficult to set parameters. I think that Bill C-475 achieves a very important objective: improving protections on the Internet.
The Privacy Commissioner has called for measures to be implemented on many occasions. My colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville included them in Bill C-475.
Therefore, we can say that we are listening to consumers. In fact, the Union des consommateurs supports this bill. I believe that it is very important to point that out. We have to crack down on Internet fraud and abuse. It is really important.
A little earlier, I heard a Conservative member on the other side of the House say that they are on the right track when it comes to protecting consumers and people's privacy on the Internet. Unfortunately, I doubt it. I will not give the Conservatives free reign, especially when it comes to consumer protection. Unfortunately, their record to this point strongly suggests otherwise.
We have a golden opportunity to have all parties in the House, no matter their political affiliation, work together to protect the privacy of Canadians, to all come together to work on a bill that I believe is extremely well researched.
Most people might think that the protection of privacy is assured and that we have a great deal of protection, especially when navigating the Internet. Unfortunately, that is not the case. There are no guidelines and we do not take action against the big companies that will take advantage of the system in order to use our personal information.
In that regard, I would like to talk about a few things that happened to us in Laval this past summer. I went door-to-door a great deal this summer in order to find out about the concerns of the constituents of Alfred-Pellan in Laval. Many issues were discussed during my visits. We talked about this earlier today. Many people talked to me about the Senate and abolishing it, and they told me that it will be a good thing when the NDP government abolishes the Senate in 2015.
People also talked to me about the bill introduced by my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville. In fact, they raised questions about what we were doing to improve people's safety on the Internet. I found that extremely interesting and we had some good discussions about that.
I talked to a young man who is in a relationship and who just bought a house. He was very interested in our policies on Internet protection and not just consumer protection. He was extremely pleased to see that the NDP had a substantive bill on the subject.
During the summer, like many of my colleagues probably, I toured a number of old age homes. People were very happy to see us. We talked about protecting personal information. That is something that is very important to our seniors because, unlike a young woman like myself, they have not been immersed in all things Internet and social media since they were young. Many people do not have access to that and it is all new to them. These are things they have to learn. It can be hard for them to understand. I can see how it might be hard for them to use social networks and to cope with the fast pace of the Internet.
Often seniors tell me that they tend to be trusting and give out their personal information. Unfortunately, there are cases in my riding of people who have lost money and are being harassed because they gave out their personal information somewhere. They suddenly receive information they did not ask for from all sorts of people. It is upsetting to them.
These people were extremely concerned about protecting their information. I talked about this bill with them and they were glad to see that there is a party in the House of Commons that wants to review the rules and cares about their safety and protecting their personal information.
I think it is important that we reach out to them in this case because they are the ones who are affected the most.
My colleague from Chambly—Borduas talked a lot about seniors. I will not elaborate on that, but I will say that we must include them in this process.
As the hon. members for Chambly—Borduas and Terrebonne—Blainville said, the federal government has a responsibility to set parameters without necessarily being too tough. At some point enough is enough. There are ways to go about this that we need to oversee. The government has a responsibility and it must step up to the plate.
I studied what this bill contains in more detail because it addresses so many items. I found that it changed some very interesting things.
I saw that Bill C-475 granted, for example, powers of enforcement to the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, which is extremely important.
As I mentioned at the beginning of my speech, the commissioner called for many changes and measures that we are dealing with right now. Any organizations that refuse to implement these measures within a time frame set by the commissioner would risk a fine of up to $500,000, according to a Federal Court decision.
At this time, there are no fines for a company or anyone who abuses on our social networks or the Internet. Putting these guidelines in place today prove that we are serious and we take privacy protection seriously.
There is also the fact that Bill C-475 would make it mandatory to report any data breaches that could harm the people involved.
I believe that this is another important item that we should pay special attention to.
I see that I am almost out of time, so I would like to list the stakeholders that have given us their support. As I mentioned at the beginning of my speech, the hon. member for Terrebonne—Blainville found during consultations that the Union des consommateurs supports our position. Aubrey LeBlanc, president of the Consumers Council of Canada, has come out in support of our position, as has Steve Anderson, executive director at OpenMedia. The National Association for Information Destruction Canada and the University of Ottawa's Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic also agree with our position.
The list goes on and on. I believe that proves, as I said earlier, that we need to work together, tackle this problem, put partisanship aside for once, make the right decisions and support Canadians.