Information & Ethics committee  Yes, Mr. Chairman, the honourable member is completely right. On January 1, 2004, some amazing misinterpretations of PIPEDA were circulating, and I think there was a sense of panic. Of course, a lot of that was the fact that the office had been in such upheaval and hadn't done what ideally it would have done, although it did consult with small business.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes.

Information & Ethics committee  In the course of this winter, I think, Mr. Chairman.

Information & Ethics committee  You referred to Alberta and British Columbia, but that's also the case in Quebec. To answer your question, I'd say that the time is very important. I believe we haven't really had the opportunity to implement this act as we should have done, let's say, until April 1 of this year, when we had granted a budget commensurate with our tasks and had an office stable enough and an implementation plan that had been thought out in advance, that was coherent and that reflected the needs of both parties, etc.

Information & Ethics committee  We can seek remedial measures before the Federal Court.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, in a Federal Court judgment. The purpose of the act is to settle complaints. I think the purpose of an act isn't, in itself, to make orders. The purpose of the act and of the machinery that administers it is to ensure compliance. If you take a close look — which few people have done — at current compliance with this act regarding the complaints process, you'll see that it's very great, except for a few judgments such as in the Blood Tribe judgment, for example.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes. What would be most useful to the committee?

Information & Ethics committee  Could I do both, Mr. Chairman? Very briefly, to the honourable member, we forget that in the current model the Privacy Commissioner has a whole series of powers. We forget because they were not used in a consistent way from the beginning. We are now taking cases to the Federal Court and are involved in 12 cases.

Information & Ethics committee  Okay, certainly.

Information & Ethics committee  Certainly. I think the B.C. definition, as I understand it, is well received in B.C.—and I think you may have the commissioner here to comment on that. I will simply reiterate, from the point of view of the protection of privacy, that when you go for any definition of work product, it may have the effect of narrowing the protections for other related information related to a person's employment.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, I certainly care. I care that the law is as easy to apply as possible, because privacy is a fundamental right in this country and Parliament has adopted this law. I care about whether it is practical and easy to apply. Mr. Chairman, the assistant commissioner deals very closely with a lot of these cases, but if I may, before I ask her to give some examples of how small business tries to comply, I'll just say that Parliament, as I understand, deliberately chose a very light and flexible regulatory system in 2000.

Information & Ethics committee  You have a résumé of the answers that came back, the background information. It's a document that was given to this committee, some 36 pages, and you have a résumé of the positions.

Information & Ethics committee  That's an excellent question, Mr. Chairman. Most of our complaints are against the large organizations that are the federally regulated organizations. In some provinces, of course, we don't see the small business, because it's the provincial laws that apply. Certainly when PIPEDA first came we had extensive meetings--particularly the assistant privacy commissioner responsible for PIPEDA had extensive meetings with representatives of small business.

Information & Ethics committee  I wasn't thinking of that, Mr. Chairman. I was thinking that the burden of compliance generally tends to fall quite harshly on small businesses. In that sense, it's my own personal opinion that I think we may not be doing enough. I mentioned this interactive video that would be a learning tool.

Information & Ethics committee  I think it would involve both. Our position is that we should be able to look at the documents to see if they would be subject to a solicitor-client privilege, and if not, to examine them to see if they have personal information relevant to the investigation.