Matthew Dubé

[Questions on the Order Paper, June 15th, 2015]

With regard to the children’s fitness tax credit: (a) does the government have in its possession studies measuring the impact of the tax credit on the level of sports participation among young Canadians, including studies on the increase of the level of sports participation of young Canadians after this tax credit was introduced; (b) what has been the impact of this tax credit on parents’ decisions to register their children in physical activities when they are eligible for the tax credit; and (c) has the governement conducted an evaluation of this tax credit after four years, as called for by a group of experts appointed in 2006 to advise Finance Canada on developing the children’s fitness tax credit?

[Points of Order, June 9th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I applaud the government's willingness to try to get more kids active. Obviously, youth inactivity has been a big problem in Canada. A couple of years ago a report card was issued giving us a D, which is far from where we want to be.

On that note, I have a question about the fitness tax credit. The member alluded to people having that extra money, allowing them to sign their kids up for physical activity. I asked an order paper question a couple of months ago and another one, the answer to which should be coming before the end of this sitting, but I would ask the member to give me a little preview of that answer. Does he know how many new people actually signed up for organized sports in their communities—up to this point, I have been unable to get that answer from the government—or is it only benefiting people who had already signed up for physical activity? Is this really doing something to solve the problem of youth inactivity?

[Economic Action Plan 2015 Act, No. 1, June 9th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I will start by quickly setting the record straight after my colleague claimed that we are against lowering taxes for small businesses. In fact, the NDP proposed such measures even before the government presented its budget.

However, I want to focus on unpaid internships and on protecting the young people who work in federally regulated workplaces. We introduced a bill that the government opposed, but that would have improved conditions by preventing sexual harassment or unreasonable work shifts, which, in a very high profile case, even led to a death. In the Standing Committee on Finance, the minister's colleagues voted against including concrete measures in the budget, even though they had committed to bringing in these protections.

Could he explain why the government does not want to include concrete measure to protect interns and young workers in this omnibus budget bill, especially since the bill contains all kinds of things that have nothing to do with the budget?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, June 5th, 2015]

With regard to government grants and contributions in the riding of Chambly–Borduas, from fiscal year 2006–2007 to the present, what were the amounts provided, broken down by (i) year, (ii) amount, (iii) recipient?

[Women's World Cup of Soccer, June 4th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise in the House to announce the opening of the Women's World Cup of soccer, which will take place in several Canadian cities from June 6 to July 5. Canada will welcome the world this summer for the biggest soccer competition on the planet. Five hundred and fifty-two players representing 23 nations will participate in this ultimate test of courage and determination pitting the best soccer players in the world against one another. This world cup is a wonderful opportunity for all of us to watch these accomplished athletes up close as they give their all for their sport and their country.

We all remember the captivating bronze medal performance of Team Canada in the 2012 Olympics, led by Christine Sinclair. It was exciting and inspiring. I have no doubt these remarkable athletes will once again make us proud.

Today, I join my colleagues in welcoming the world to Canada and wishing Team Canada the best of luck.

[Digital Privacy Act, June 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech.

The Supreme Court recently established that the government must have a warrant to obtain personal information from a private company. In committee, several witnesses said that the bill contained no provisions making it mandatory to get such a warrant from the court, so we have to wonder whether the bill is even constitutional.

Is the minister concerned about that? If so, can she tell us why the government rejected all amendments at committee stage despite the Conservatives' show of good will in sending the bill to committee right away?

[Digital Privacy Act, June 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his question.

There is a lot of information circulating, and our world is changing quickly. The challenge for us as legislators is to stay on top of all these changes.

Sometimes some information that seems innocuous can pose a threat to our privacy. An IP address, for example, can identify the location where we accessed the Internet, the device we used and what we did with it. All manner of information is hidden, and sometimes we are not even aware that it exists.

One aspect of this problem can be addressed through public education. However, as my colleague mentioned, the government has a responsibility to protect Canadians.

A private company with personal information about a citizen has an obligation to protect it. Sometimes, despite great efforts, this information can be lost or even stolen.

The government itself could ask for this information for reasons of national security. That is why the courts need guidelines that must be spelled out in the law to ensure that the government cannot simply extract this information from companies.

If that information is stolen from companies or if they lose it, there has to be a way to ensure that the Privacy Commissioner is informed and has the right tools to take action and protect people.

[Digital Privacy Act, June 2nd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to speak to the very important Bill S-4. It concerns the sharing of personal information in the digital age. It deals mainly with the way in which we legislate against companies responsible for the loss or sharing of information. We know this is a very sensitive issue because we are in the digital age where more and more personal information is found online. We think first of banking information, and also of information that sometimes seems not that important, but that is nevertheless part of peoples' private lives. It is information that we share on social networks, such as photos.

This covers all kinds of of complex issues, such as copyright, that we have addressed in the House since the last election, and the dissemination of information pertaining to national security. We had an important debate on this issue during the debate on Bill C-51. We learned that information technology companies, or startups, had concerns about some of the bill's provisions.

Of course, we are all familiar with the infamous story of Bill C-30, where the minister of public safety and emergency preparedness at the time told us that we stood either with the government or with child pornographers. This example shows just how big an issue we are dealing with and the Conservatives' poor record in this regard.

First, I would like to mention something very important and very simple: the obligation to review the privacy legislation every five years. Obviously, this is very important given how quickly technology changes. Unfortunately, such a review has not been implemented. A number of bills were introduced in this regard, but they died on the order paper when the Prime Minister prorogued Parliament. There was, of course, Bill C-30, which is a whole other story, and there was also the bill introduced by my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville. That bill, which the government refused to support, sought to implement a robust privacy review process, give more power to the Privacy Commissioner and have clearer legislative provisions.

Bill S-4 includes similar provisions. However, they do not go far enough and there are still worrisome loopholes. One of the grey areas that I am particularly concerned about has to do with organizations, such as banks, that could share private information. These organizations are required to report a loss of personal information to the Privacy Commissioner only “if it is reasonable in the circumstances to believe that the breach creates a real risk of significant harm to an individual”. That may seem clear, but when it comes to legislative measures, we can see that there is a lot of leeway in how this provision of the bill is worded. The company could decide that no one's privacy was really violated and that there was no risk of harm to the individual and simply not report the privacy breach.

One of the flaws in this bill is the requirement for a court warrant, which my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville brought up earlier and which she included in her bill. The Supreme Court recently ruled that any invasion of privacy by the government and any request that the government makes to a private company that is in possession of our information require a mandate. There is no such requirement in this bill, which is extremely worrisome. That is why I made the link earlier to Bill C-51 and the debate on Bill C-30, which did not end up taking place because we managed to get the government to back down. The government seems to be on the wrong track and does not seem to take privacy seriously.

Its record is a great example of that. How many times does the House need to hear criticisms about mismanagement at the Canada Revenue Agency, for example, during question period or at every possible opportunity, whether it is when bills are introduced and petitions are presented or at press conferences?

This department is in possession of the most sensitive information on Canadians, such as their social insurance numbers and their tax information. The department has been the victim of data breaches, and the government does not seem to be taking any responsibility. That makes it hard for us to trust that the government will require private companies to comply with high privacy standards when it is not capable of doing so itself. This situation is extremely worrisome.

We know that this is a complex issue because more and more things are done online. As far as matters of national security are concerned, we know that as legislators we have work to do. We wanted to propose amendments to ensure that this bill went further and complied with the Supreme Court decision. Like a number of witnesses in committee, we question the constitutionality of this bill in its current form.

If I am not mistaken, the 18 amendments the NDP proposed were all rejected. True to form, the Conservatives did not listen to any of the testimony or pay any regard to the amendments proposed by all the parties. The amendments proposed by the NDP were all based on what the public had to say and on the very hard work of my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville, who was trying to get suitable provisions for 2015, not 2000. Technology changes and so does our reality, and we have to adjust accordingly.

In this context, there are a number of troubling aspects. First, this bill was introduced in the Senate, which, naturally, we criticize every chance we get. The Minister of Industry made an announcement about how he wants to proceed in the digital age, but instead of introducing this bill in the House himself, he introduced it in the Senate. That is one problem.

The second problem is that the Conservatives wanted to skip second reading and send the bill straight to committee. That is not a bad idea in and of itself. The NDP has asked for the same in order to study certain extremely complex files.

For example, we asked to take this approach for Bill C-23, which we called the “electoral deform” bill. Since the government wanted to go straight to committee, we thought it was willing to accept amendments and listen to witnesses, but that did not happen.

The third problem concerns another of the government's bad habits: the honour of the 97th time allocation motion was bestowed on Bill S-4 in order to limit debate. Unfortunately, at this rate, the Conservatives will have moved 100 such motions by the time the election is held. To be blunt, that is pretty shabby.

Although it is important to protect Canadians' privacy and to do what it takes, in 2015, to implement an approach appropriate for the digital age, recent Supreme Court decisions have cast doubt on the constitutionality of this bill.

This bill does not go far enough, and since the government wants to limit debate and does not accept the amendments and the work done in committee, we cannot and will not support this bill. I am very pleased to rise in the House to say that.

[Business of Supply, June 1st, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, the member told us that we should be doing our research. However, I would suggest that maybe he should do his. The fact is, despite all this bragging about the government's record up to this point, the Conservatives' code of conduct is voluntary. It is based on nothing but a good faith agreement. It is great that the Conservatives have sat down with stakeholders, but what has come out of those meetings is nothing but a good faith agreement to follow a voluntary code of conduct.

What we are asking for with this motion is that we finally put in place some concrete measures and a real code of conduct that would oblige banks to stop fleecing their customers when they try to access their own money or pay their bills with their money.

Despite the fact that the Conservatives say they are going in the right direction, does the member not agree that the code of conduct should be obligatory, not a voluntary one as it is right now? It is not leading to anything.

[Petitions, June 1st, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, considering that a vote will be held this evening on this very issue, I am pleased to present a petition signed by hundreds of Canadians regarding the tax on feminine hygiene products, which unfairly targets women. This measure is supported by the people of Chambly—Borduas. I look forward to this evening's vote, which will be a victory for women.