Main Estimates 2020–21

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Privacy Act Reform

What are the 3 key messages for the Minister:

• The Government of Canada is committed to reviewing the Privacy Act to ensure it keeps pace with the effects of both technological change and evolving Canadian values.
• The government is currently undertaking a careful review of the Privacy Act in preparation to introducing legislative reforms.
• The Government will continue to take into account the views of Canadians and stakeholders, including the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, as the review progresses.
• Question: Why is the government only now reviewing the Privacy Act?
  Answer: Much has changed since the Act first came into force in 1983. The Act is quasi-constitutional privacy legislation that requires a careful recalibration to ensure that it meets Canadians modern expectations about privacy and about how Government should use their information. Our Government intends to continue to engage experts, organizations, advocates and Canadians as the review progresses.
• Question: What changes to the Privacy Act is the Government planning to make?
  Answer: Given the importance of the Act, as well as its age, the entire Act is being examined to identify changes that would align with Canadians’ current expectations about how to protect their privacy while allowing the Government to better serve Canadians and keep them safe. We will continue to engage with experts and Canadians as the review progresses.
• Question: In his recent annual report, the Privacy Commissioner made a number of recommendations for reforming Canada’s privacy laws, including amending the Privacy Act to apply to Ministers’ Offices. Will the Government adopt these recommendations?
  Answer: We welcome the Privacy Commissioner’s views as we look at reforming the Privacy Act. We are committed to continue engaging the Privacy Commissioner and his office, as well as experts, organizations, advocates, and Canadians, as the review progresses.
• Question: In his recent annual report, the Privacy Commissioner outlined a number of findings against government institutions, and noted that privacy breaches were underreported in the public sector. What is the government doing to protect the personal information of Canadians now?
  Answer: The Government takes the privacy of Canadians very seriously. Federal institutions are subject not only to the Privacy Act, but also a suite of important polices and directives governing the protection of personal information. However, there are opportunities for the Government to modernize the current legislative framework so that it better meets Canadians expectations in the 21^st century.

Background:

Justice Canada in leading the modernization of the Privacy Act. The modernization of the Act supports the Minister of Justice’s December 2019 Mandate Letter commitment to “[w]ork with the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry and the Minister of Canadian Heritage to advance Canada’s Digital Charter and enhance powers for the Privacy Commissioner, in order to establish a new set of online rights.”

On November 24, 2016, the Minister of Justice advised the House of Commons Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics Committee (ETHI) that Justice would lead a review of the Privacy Act, and the Government’s April 12, 2017, response to the ETHI committee’s report on the review of the Privacy Act advised that the Government would “engage Canadians, experts, organizations and advocates as the review progresses”.

Justice officials have engaged interdepartmental and select external stakeholders in support of Privacy Act modernization since 2016, including the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada. In summer 2019, Justice Canada conducted a preliminary targeted engagement with expert stakeholders. The overall feedback received from this preliminary engagement has been supportive of the modernization of the Act, and a “What We Heard” Report was published on the Justice Canada website on in June 2020. Public consultations on the modernization of the Privacy Act are currently planned for fall 2020.

On October 20, 2020, the Privacy Commissioner tabled his annual report for 2019-2020. The Report’s overarching policy theme addresses the pandemic’s negative impact on privacy and reflects the Commissioner’s perspective that there continues to be an “urgent need for law reform”, and suggests that the Government’s COVID pandemic related initiatives highlighted broader concerns relating to law reform. The Report also suggests there is a systemic under-reporting of privacy breaches within the Government.

The Report also summarizes key findings of several investigations by the Privacy Commissioner, including into Statistics Canada’s proposed collection of banking data from Canadians, and into the leak relating to a Supreme Court of Canada nominee. With respect to this latter investigation, the Report states that he was only able to investigate the complaint as against the Department of Justice and Privy Council Office, since they are both subject to the Privacy Act, but not against the Office of the Prime Minister and the Office of the Commissioner of Federal Judicial Affairs, since they are not. The Commissioner recommended in his Report that the Government should amend the Privacy Act to apply to Ministers’ Offices so that the handling by these offices of personal information would receive oversight.

In the 2015 election, the Liberal Party of Canada promised to appropriately subject Ministers’ Offices to the Access to Information Act. However, in Bill C-58, which was adopted by Parliament in June 2019, Ministers’ Offices were only subjected to a proactive publication scheme that excludes oversight by the Information Commissioner. [Redacted]. TBS is currently leading the statutory review of the ATIA.

Diversity in Judicial Appointments

• Achieving greater diversity throughout the entire justice system is a major challenge, and I welcome the increased attention this issue is receiving.
• An important part of this challenge is ensuring that the Canadian judiciary reflects the face our diverse society. Although there is still more work to do, I’m very proud of our government’s record.
• The first step to a more diverse bench requires a more diverse pool of applicants. That’s why I’ve been proactive in reaching out to lawyers, law students, law associations and stakeholders, particularly from under-represented communities, asking them to encourage qualified candidates from their communities to apply.
• This includes hosting two forums on Judicial Diversity on the Bench – one that took place in English earlier this fall, and another that will take place in French in late November.
• Finally, increasing judicial diversity requires knowing who is applying and who we are appointing. This is why, as part of the process reforms we introduced in 2016, we asked the Commissioner for Federal Judicial Affairs to collect and publish information on the demographics of both applicants for judicial office and appointees.
• This was to ensure transparency and to allow Canadians to hold us to account for our commitment to increase the diversity of Canada’s judiciary.
• Question: What is the Government’s track record on achieving its commitment for a more diverse superior court bench?
  Answer: Since 2015, we have appointed more than 400 superior court judges, more than half of whom are women, and with increasing numbers of individuals who self-identify as visible minority, LGBTQ2+, Indigenous or as living with a disability.
  And since being re-elected last year, nearly 59% of newly-appointed judges have been women, 19% visible minorities, 9% from the LGBTQ2+ communities, and 3% Indigenous.

Background:

Recent media stories have focused on the level of diversity within the superior court judiciary, including whether the process reforms implemented in October 2016 have been as effective as hoped at increasing diversity. Many of the concerns were articulated in two widely-publicized letters sent to the Minister of Justice on September 14, 2020. One was signed by 36 legal organization and clinics led by the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers (CARL); the second was from the current and past presidents of the Canadian Bar Association (CBA).

On September 17, 2020, the Minister hosted a virtual Forum on Diversity on the Bench (in English; French event to follow on November 26). This event was well received, and allowed attendees from across Canada to hear from two recently-appointed judges and a member of the BC Judicial Advisory Committee (JAC). The Q&A portion raised issues similar to those identified in the CARL and CBA letters.

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