Well, I did not notice any huge Canadian breaches this week, nor did any regulator release a big investigation report, but we definitely have some privacy-related news to talk about and some rather lively television.
This week marked the first two hearings of the Canadian Parliament's Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology tasked with studying Bill C-27, the Digital Charter Implementation Act.
Included in the omnibus bill is legislation to modernize our federal privacy landscape, replacing part one of Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act with a new law called the Consumer Privacy Protection Act. The bill also introduces the Artificial Intelligence and Data Act. A sorely needed good start at putting some regulation around a technology that has profound implications for society and humanity.
The problem, however, with what should have been a promising first few steps into examining our new laws is that the government came to the table early in the week saying the law was going to be amended in some pretty important areas — like making privacy a fundamental right.
For some inexplicable reason, they were not willing to actually share those amendments they kept referring to. So, most of the first meeting was about the committee's frustration at not having the information they need to do their job.
The second witness to appear was Privacy Commissioner of Canada Philippe Dufresne. The commissioner gave his opening remarks and highlighted his 15 recommendations to the current version of the bill. But while Dufresne and his officials sat there, the rest of the debate among committee members was about whether to require Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry François-Philippe Champagne to produce actual amendments within five days and, in the meantime, pause the study.
I'm not sure how the committee or witnesses could have a fruitful discussion about the direction of the bill without knowing how the government intends to change it. It's like going in blindfolded. What if the approach to the changes is problematic? Does each witness appear twice?
It's unclear where this is all going to land, but let me express my personal frustration with how Bill C-27 has been treated so far. Let's hope they sort out this problem quickly and get back to being able to properly assess and discuss the bill.
Let's not let this opportunity for law reform go to waste.