Information & Ethics committee  Yes, at first, in the sense of trying to adapt to a new law, to create processes in the firm to respond to it. But they do not begrudge that, because as I said, this is an industry whose very livelihood is dependent on good privacy protection. Except that once you go through a whole process of education—and as I said, there are two layers.

Information & Ethics committee  I would say we have no indication that where there's an order-making power, there's better implementation of privacy protection. In other words, the ombudsman process is simpler and more straightforward for both complainants and the companies involved, and it seems to be producing good results.

Information & Ethics committee  About 70% of our members are small companies and 30% are larger companies, 70% Canadian-based. It's a very international industry, maybe about 30% multinationals—not the same overlap, because there are some Canadian-based multinationals. They're involved in computers, all kinds of computer technology, mobile technology, telecommunications technology, software, information technology services, and consulting.

Information & Ethics committee  I would feel uneasy about that. I think the brunt of what people see going on and the statistics quoted by Professor Kerr show there really isn't a problem. I would hesitate to say we're going to legislate another regulatory body just because we think we might be able to improve things.

Information & Ethics committee  We haven't addressed this issue either. Mr. Kerr's comments seem reasonable, but that is no reason to add special powers in the legislation. I have nothing more to add.

Information & Ethics committee  It's not an issue that we have addressed as an association, so we have no expertise to bring.

Information & Ethics committee  I can try to give you an answer, Mrs. Lavalée. The law we are talking about does not prevent the disclosure of identity. The commissioner decides on a case-by-case basis whether this is reasonable or not.

Information & Ethics committee  If I may add something, when I talked earlier about being careful not to amend the law if it's not really necessary, as I heard from the Canadian Bar Association, there's one category of information for investigations pertaining to litigation. We have no views on that. That might well be required.

Information & Ethics committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Ms. Seigel will deliver our presentation, but I would like to say a few words first to put it into context. Our association represents Canadian information and communications technologies, or the ICT industry, including everything to do with computers, software and telecommunications from equipment to service.

Government Operations committee  In our business, it's very often how you define what you're going to buy. Just to give you an example, you can take on a project to develop a solution that can generate considerable savings. You might decide that you need your best capable person to run that project and that person might cost twice the price of someone else but might give you a result that's much better, within time, and so on.

Government Operations committee  That's right. If you define that you're going to buy a desktop based only on the cost of the box--and I'm not saying they do this--if you take into account the applications it comes with, how complex and expensive it's going to be maintain and upgrade, who's going to do the upgrading, if you buy the whole service during the life cycle, that might represent $100; the box might cost $15.

Government Operations committee  Oh yes, the channels of communication are there, and we are looking forward to getting the results.

Government Operations committee  Perhaps I may say on that one that the objective to cut the cost of procurement by 10% and the cycle time of procurement by 50% are the good kinds of objectives to have. We have small members who have practically given up on trying to sell services to the government because it's too complex.

Government Operations committee  We have the same issue, but a little bit of a different perspective because of what our members sell. Our small members are quite prepared to compete for government business. They're mainly interested, large or small, in selling solutions, and in selling technologically advanced approaches, and selling projects or working in projects that are innovative.

Government Operations committee  Maybe I'll start by saying that in our case we do participate on a regular basis in consultations with the government. We've been trying hard to help improve a process that really is in need of tremendous improvement, because government buys in a way that's much more complex than it needs to be, and that hurts everybody.