Mr. Speaker, last December the issues of confidentiality of private health information being shared by Canadian authorities with the U.S. border service was raised by me and my colleague, the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca.

The incident that causes me and others such great concern over the security of our private health information stemmed from the treatment that Ellen Richardson, a paraplegic and a constituent of mine, received on her way through the United States to take a Caribbean vacation with the March of Dimes.

She was stopped at the U.S. border by a security agent who questioned her about a hospitalization episode that she had experienced in 2012 for depression. As a result, she was denied entrance into the U.S. for her mental illness episode, and unfortunately lost her cruise. The U.S. authority had detailed information about her hospitalization.

Last December 2, we asked the minister to explain to the House how a U.S. border agent would know about a Canadian's private medical history. The answer we got was less than satisfactory. It was simply that the government was committed to ensuring the privacy of Canadian health files and that health information was a provincial responsibility.

However, that did not explain how Mrs. Richardson's private health information got into the hands of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. I followed up on December 3 with a more direct question: What was the government going to do to ensure that the private medical records of Canadians would be protected?

The answer I received from the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness was less than helpful, but it was revealing. He said, “I can tell the member that we have the Canadian Police Information Centre, but his question should be addressed to the U.S. authority.”

The Canadian Police Information Centre is a database maintained by the RCMP, a federal agency that collects data shared by police forces across Canada. It has data on wanted persons by legal authorities, people accused of crimes, people under criminal surveillance, people on probation or parole, missing persons, wandering persons registered under the wandering persons registry, and stolen property. It is a database that is shared, apparently without any fetter, with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

When the minister said “we have the Canadian Police Information Centre, but his question should be addressed to the U.S. authority”, he is essentially telling us that Mrs. Richardson's information was in CPIC and that we should question the U.S. policy that led to refusing Mrs. Richardson transit through the U.S. to her cruise.

However, he misses the point. Mrs. Richardson is not a person who has a criminal record. She is not wanted by the police or under surveillance, and she is not on probation or parole. Her medical information is there due to a 9-1-1 call involving her hospitalization episode, which is hardly a criminal activity. This is not information that needed to be shared with anybody, let alone the U.S.

Again, what is the government doing about protecting the private medical information of Canadians? The RCMP is a federal agency. It is responsible for the Canadian Police Information Centre. It controls what is held in it and what can or ought to be released to non-Canadian agencies. Clearly, non-criminal information and private health information of Canadian citizens ought not to be shared.

The government claims to respect the privacy of the medical records of Canadians, so what steps will it take to ensure this is done with respect to the Canadian Police Information Centre?

Mike Sullivan

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