16 Jun 2022
Parliament Bills C-13 and S-4 pose imminent threats to privacy and net neutrality
Winnipeg, MB – June 11, 2022 – The Pirate Party of Canada, is a registered political party supporting civil rights, improved democracy, reform of intellectual law, free sharing of knowledge, information privacy, transparency, freedom of information, and network neutrality, announced today its opposition to several anti-internet and anti-privacy bills recently brought before Canadian Parliament. The announcement of opposition is in specific reference to Bills C-13 and S-4, successors to Bill C-30.
Bill C-13
Parliament Bill C-30, otherwise known as the “You Are Either With Us Or The Child Pornographers” Bill, is back and is repackaged into several other bills in order to dull opposition and dilute its true intentions. Canadians spoke loud and clear that they reject the kinds of privacy intrusions introduced by Bill C-30 when it was originally introduced and shot down more than two years ago. It is abominable for the government to reintroduce the bill by stealth under the guise of alternate issues and in a rushed manner that is designed to push the bill through.
Bill C-13, the “Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act” purports itself as a protection from cyberbullying, but the truth is that only a small part of this bill is about cyberbullying at all. Rather, the majority of C-13 is about expanding police powers to seize Internet data from Canadian citizens without the currently required warrants. The passing of this bill into law constitutes a serious breach of personal privacy and will enable mass surveillance by the state in a way that bypasses standard judicial oversight. The mother of Amanda Todd, the teenager who took her own life due to cyberbullying and the raison d’être for this bill, had called for this bill to be split to allow careful consideration of the privacy related provisions.
The consequences of such a far-reaching and comprehensive threat to privacy will be similar to the intent of the C-30 online spying bill. The criminal code currently limits police forces by requiring a court orders to obtain data for investigative purposes. Current data shows service providers have responded to close to 1 million of such requests over the past year. And that is from three telecommunications company only.
This bill would offer blanket immunity to companies sharing personal information. This could lead to companies disclosing their customers’ personal data without due process of the law. Under a “voluntary and automatic handover of data,” provided to the companies under this bill, police could ask for any data, any time, without having to give a reason.
In essence, this bill would bring a level of mass surveillance to Canada, similar to those seen in the U.S. in recent years as revealed by Edward Snowden.
“In the face of recent revelations of spying on Canadians and the sharing of this data with the NSA, this level of government sanctioned privacy infringement without due process of law is truly troubling,” says Fred Hebert of the Pirate Party’s Political Council.
The Pirate Party calls for careful debate on this matter in parliament. Use of time allocation and other tricky Parliamentary Procedures in order to shorten the debate and limit the public’s input will only reinforce public perception that the government is afraid of detailed study of this bill. Telecommunication companies could willingly give out personal data to a government obsessed with warrantless surveillance when the immunity is combined with financial incentives. The Canada Border Services Agency has already been reported to have paid companies for their user’s personal data. The incentives could cost well over a million dollar at current pre-C-13 and S-4 mass spying level. The government is already willing to spent billions to build a mass surveillance palace. The number of requests, hence amount spent to pay the telecommunications companies, could increase exponentially once the C-13 and S-4 is passed into law.
Bill S-4
Senate bill S-4 would amend the “Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act” to allow mass surveillance without warrants, continuing the intent of the C-30 spying bill.
Subsection 7(5) of the Act is replaced with clear provisions attempting to allow disclosure of user information between companies both without the consent of users and without a warrant.
Under Bill S-4, a company could ask for a user’s personal information and easily obtain it. For instance, requests based merely on allegations of a website’s terms of service agreement being violated.
The case of Teksavvy vs Voltage has courts mandating that a court order is required before the disclosure of personal information. This bill effectively enacts the opposite and allows copyright troll organizations to ask for personal information, without a warrant, on any user they may dislike. A serious implication to consider is that the passing of such a bill could lead to increased requests by other commercial industries outside law enforcement who seek personal information based simply on unproven allegations of “breach of contract.”
Appointment of new Privacy Commissioner
At a time when the improvement of privacy protection is paramount, the government appointed Daniel Therrien as the privacy commissioner. The journalist Stephen Maher referred to Therrien as being responsible for privacy intrusion on a grand scale. Daniel Therrien co-led a team that allows sharing of Canadian medical histories with the U.S., something Ontario’s privacy commissioner is currently fighting in court to stop.
The appointment of a strong privacy advocate to this influential position, that has the power to stop government abuse on privacy, would show the government’s sincerity in dealing with privacy concerns. Daniel Therrien’s appointment should be reconsidered. If the appointment is pushed through, a Pirate MP would seek to have Parliament review his performance up until that point.
Conclusions
Together, Bills C-13 and S-4 poison the Internet and erode the privacy of all users, which in this day and age is a formidable majority of the citizen population.
Companies who engage in practices that violate the basic rights of citizens should note the negative publicity that will inevitably result. We fully support the “Ottawa Statement on Privacy” of which we are a signatory.
The Pirate Party calls upon the Canadian government to respect its people’s privacy. The Pirate Party fully supports the Open Internet Policies necessary for a thriving information economy in a free and open society. If these bills are passed, a Pirate MP or government would seek to abolish them and sanction any company or individual who had compromised Canadians’ privacy.
“The more people who see these heinous bills for the hidden threats they truly are, the better,” says James Wilson, Leader of the Pirate Party of Canada. “We will not sit idly by and let the wool be pulled over the public’s eyes. It’s time to hold our government to a higher standard.”
Related articles and post:
https://openmedia.ca/news/canada%E2%80%99s-leading-privacy-exprts-unite-behind-ottawa-statement-offer-high-level-proposals-rein-mass
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/7116/125/
http://o.canada.com/news/national/maher-prime-minister-stephen-harper-liberal-leader-justin-trudeau-agree-on-spooky-pick-for-next-privacy-commissioner
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/06/03/new_privacy_watchdog_gave_legal_advice_to_canadian_spy_agencies.html
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/privacy-commissioner-ann-cavoukian-files-legal-motion-against-toronto-police-1.2666289
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/11/28/disabled_woman_denied_entry_to_us_after_agent_cites_supposedly_private_medical_details.html
23 May 2022
“Over 35 leading academics and 19 organizations sign on in support of the Ottawa Statement on Mass Surveillance, which sets out what needs to be done to protect Canadians from out-of-control mass surveillance”
“Professor David Murakami Wood, Canada Research Chair in Surveillance Studies, Queen’s University, said: “Canada is deploying ever more surveillance in the name of safety and security, but the end result is discrimination, the reduction of privacy and the chilling of free speech. We need to stop and take stock of where Canada is going and if it is the kind of place that we would want to live in.””
Link to Full Statement{.extern}
16 Jun 2022
Fox Creek, AB – May 9th
On Wednesday Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau announced that all future party candidates would be expected to vote pro-choice in Parliament and he will not be signing the nomination papers of candidates that refuse to agree to do so. Currently voting on this issue is a matter of conscience. The Pirate Party of Canada views Trudeau’s actions as a further tightening of party discipline in Canada.
It is also an open question how Trudeau intends to enforce this if MP Michael Chong’s caucus reform bill passes. Chong’s reform bill takes candidate confirmation out of the party leader’s hands and gives it to the local riding associations. If Trudeau is aware of this it may be a hint he intends to oppose the reform bill. The Pirate Party’s policy is to have a suggested way of voting for our MPs but not to whip the vote. Instead we will seek consensus through open and honest debate.
“I can understand Trudeau’s desire to have everyone ‘sing from the same hymn book’ on an issue vital to their party. If a Pirate Party candidate stated that they supported tighter intellectual property laws or increased government surveillance I’d have a hard time signing their nomination papers. However, if the membership said that is the candidate they wanted I would bow to their judgement. Ultimately party policy should be directed by the membership, not the party leader”, says James Wilson, Leader of the Pirate Party of Canada. “As well, there is a real danger for parties in requiring ideological purity; the party becomes an echo chamber repeating back the same view. It is the dissenting voices challenging the prevailing view that creates debate and growth. It is sad the Liberal party may slowly be losing this”.
The Pirate Party of Canada is a federal political party focused on thoughtful information policy reform, genuine democracy, civil liberties, and the freedom of the Internet. You can find out more online at www.pirateparty.ca .
16 Jun 2022
While issues concerning the elimination of vouching have been discussed at length it is not the most damaging change proposed in Bill C-23. Several of the provisions of C-23 would greatly increase how much money parties can fundraise. As events south of the border demonstrate the infusion of greater funds into elections does not lead to better democracy but instead provides a constant distraction to parties and elected representatives.
In the US Congress new representatives are instructed to devote at least four hours every day to fundraising. That is twice the amount of time they are instructed to put towards committee hearings, floor votes, or meetings with constituents. While Canada has not embraced the near-limitless fundraising common in the United States C-23 moves us towards it. How will this effect Canadians? For starters an increase in how much a party can raise and spend also increases how much money a party needs to win. This in turn increases the time a party and its candidates need to devote to fundraising. This leaves less time and energy for the development and examination of policy. The end result being a lower quality of representation in Ottawa.
“Interestingly the statistics Conservatives quote seem to support there being no need to raise the donation cap. On Thursday at a Senate hearing regarding C-23 Senator Donald Plett noted that the average donation by a Conservative Party donor was a mere $99/donor. If the average Conservative donor, and indeed the average Canadian, donates well below the cap is that not an argument for lowering the donation cap rather than raising it? It seems to me that keeping the cap closer to what the average Canadian can donate keeps any one group from having too much influence on our democratic system”, says James Wilson, Leader of the Pirate Party of Canada. “There are several highly questionable parts of C-23, it is unfortunate that debate seems to be highly focused around the vouching issue.” The Pirate Party requests that the parties in Parliament think carefully whether they actually need the added fundraising revenue and whether it is worth the potential consequences.
12 Apr 2022
Here is the full text from the opening statement given by Ric Lim for Pirate Party of Canada. Link to video can be found at the bottom.
This was delivered on April 10, 2022 before the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs. The proceeding as described by the Committee chair Bob Runciman:
“Bill C23, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act and other acts and to make consequential amendments to certain acts. This bill proposes amendments to numerous aspects of Canada’s electoral law along with related amendments to the Telecommunications Act, the Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act and the Director of Public Prosecutions Act among other acts.”
Our Opening Statement
Good afternoon. My name is Ric Lim, I am here from the Pirate Party of Canada. We are a federal political party focused on reform to information law and democracy in the 21st century. One of our founding principle is Open Government. This could easily be realized using practical technological solutions to implement a real-time, automatic online disclosures of spendings and other datas. These are essential to a frugal and honest government. It will help make Guaranteed Income or Mincome feasible. We believe in making Canada the best place in the world to live in. We offer an important alternative voice. Having more real choices is good for democracy. It is hard to compete against established and well funded parties. We have accepted the challenge because Canadians are not being properly served and Bill C-23 is evidence of this.
Bill C-23 is about to make competition harder. It creates loopholes allowing established parties to spend millions more. In a virtually limitless spending environment, rich parties and well-funded special interest groups have undue influence. As demonstrated south of the border and pointed out by the Boston Globe (May 12 2013 article by Tracy Jan), members of congress spent twice as much time on fundraising than on committee hearings, floor votes, or meetings with constituents. By introducing more money into the system we risk adding a level of distraction our lawmakers do not need. Furthermore, allegations against Dean Del Maestro, whether true or not, demonstrate one way of how the ban on corporate donations can easily be circumvented. C-23 does not address this problem but instead create new ones.
Another major point that is less often discussed is the central poll supervisor could become a partisan appointee. Sure, there are deputies and poll watchers that are partisans, to provide checks and balances. But making the central poll supervisor a biased partisan from a winning party is like picking a judge from the prosecution team.
The difference between established democracy like ours, and countries where people continue to die fighting for democracy, is we trust our elections. That trust is harmed with a biased partisan as the central poll supervisor. The central poll supervisor decides whether or not a ballot is valid. A partisan central poll supervisor could lead to the systematic contesting of ballots like the ones we saw in Florida, meant to disenfranchise voters. It is heart breaking to see the integrity of our democracy dismantled like this.
Laws must be carefully considered and evaluated. It takes time for every possible point to be raised and to seek expert testimony. Otherwise the result is always, always a bad law. The Conservative Party of Canada once believed in the same thing. Many election experts have made it clear they were not consulted on C-23. The bill was rushed through the Commons with little time for debate. It has been a long time since the Senate’s duty to exercise ‘sober second thought’ was this great. This is a bad law and the Senate has a duty to send it back.
Much has already been said about vouching. We just want to say, there is no proven case of voter fraud. However, the last election saw many complaints of voter suppression. Why is the Elections Act silent about voter suppression and instead focusing on the yet to be proven voter fraud? If there is voter fraud, prosecute them. But we all know there were undeniable cases of voter suppression in the last General Election. Why are we introducing measures that will further disenfranchise more voters; especially young people and aboriginals.
It is wrong to prevent Elections Canada from encouraging people to vote. We cannot have an election body that is unable to ensure proper conduct of an election. With barely 60% of Canadians voting we need ‘all hands on deck’ for increasing turnout.
Elections Canada needs more power to investigate the voter suppression. Instead, C-23 takes power away from Elections Canada.
It was said that the experts, including 160 professors that study political law, do not understand the running of the government. Shouldn’t we be spending time discussing the points raised by experts? Government exists to serve the people. It is our servant, not our master. It should not be dismissive of either experts or ordinary citizens. Ordinary people often know more about a problem than the people at the top.
We appeal to all honourable Parliamentarians to set aside partisanship and stop this bill. There is no urgency for this reform. It is being rushed through even though it clearly has problems. It needs thoughtful debate and much more careful scrutiny. Many experts and ordinary Canadians have come forward to say this elections act is unfair and damaging. Canadians deserve better. We are better off without it.
Video links:
Event Page:
http://senparlvu.parl.gc.ca/Guide.aspx?viewmode=4&categoryid=-1¤tdate=2014-04-10&languagecode=12298&eventid=9383{.extern}
Direct link to: English Video{.extern}
Direct Link to French Video{.extern}
