Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to stand today to speak to these changes as proposed in Bill C-36 to the Statistics Canada Act.

There is no doubt that in our society we rely on information. All sectors of business rely on good data, good information to guide their decisions, and on this side of the aisle, we have always stressed the importance of that good work that Statistics Canada does.

However, the private lives of Canadians should never be put in jeopardy. It is a concern of ours that some of the changes as suggested, if not amended, to this piece of legislation could strike an improper balance between the privacy of Canadians and what Canadians feel is their private information being infringed upon and what the government uses that data for.

This is a redesign and a re-engineering of how statistics would be gathered in an effort to make them more independent, make the chief statistician more independent, but it also has to come back to what is balancing the rights of Canadians while good data is collected.

I will give examples of some of the intrusive questions that we have heard from Canadians that some have said just go beyond, perhaps, questions they are comfortable answering. That would be, “How many bathrooms do you have in your home? When do you leave for work, and when do you arrive at work?” and other questions that delve into their personal lives on the basis that somehow this data would be useful to the government for the purposes of disseminating that information for good policy-making and for good decision-making.

It is proposed in the changes to give the chief statistician total control over those questions with no ministerial control or accountability by the minister. What this means in the new set-up, in the new engineered or redesigned way of collecting data and the supervision and the management of collecting data, is that the chief statistician would, on his or her own, be able to make those decisions, not have to vet them through the minister or through the ministry or through Parliament, where we would decide perhaps on certain, larger issues, whether they are appropriate or not appropriate.

What happens when a Canadian down the road decides that, although it is mandatory to complete it, it is too intrusive into his or her personal life? How do they ask the questions? To whom do they ask the questions to find out more about why this question is being asked? It will not come back to the minister. It will not come through the regular channels of parliamentary procedure as currently exist. It will be the chief statistician having the lone decision-making and not having to be accountable to this place for the decisions on those questions.

The other issue that has been mentioned this morning already is the storage of data. The chief statistician could decide, having been given sole authority to create this independence as put forward, where this data could be stored. We talked about the importance of where it is being stored today and maintaining that integrity, but at any point in time, the chief statistician could decide to deliver that data to a third party for storage.

In fact, we saw the most recent resignation, I believe his name was Wayne Smith, over this very issue. Former chief statistician Wayne Smith resigned over the push to use Shared Services Canada to store the information. Unfortunately his concerns, which were made clear to the Liberal government, were not looked upon and it took his resignation before they would listen. We are talking again about security of Canadians, and this should be the top priority of any government.

Let us talk about the overriding governance portion of the changes that are being made and why we have concerns with that on this side. What is happening is that the governance body, the overseeing body, is changing to the Canadian statistics advisory council, a new name, from the National Statistics Council.

The key concern here is, this was put in place in 1985 by the Mulroney government as an oversight body with 13 members, representing all provinces and territories, while the new one, as proposed in this legislation, reduces that to 10 members. Why is that a concern? It is because we cannot understand why the government would want to change from representation of all provinces and territories, in terms of their input into the data that is collected. What is the reason for eliminating three spots? That means three areas of the country would not be represented.

Here is an example. If Atlantic Canada, by chance, does not have an appointee to that board, it could miss out on specific data being included and received by Statistics Canada that is specific to Atlantic Canada, because the oversight board would see all of the information being asked for as it is done. The 13-person national board that currently exists, the National Statistics Council, has representation from all parts of the country. It has worked well, frankly, since 1985. It strikes the right balance. It decides what is working and what is not working. This is a body that is working very effectively, representing all parts of the country, yet we see it would change to a smaller number.

The other concern is it perhaps could become another place for patronage appointments. It could be speculated that the 10 who would be appointed would be political appointments. They could well be people who perhaps have knowledge and background in the area of statistics, but perhaps not, because it may be someone who is looking for a board appointment, who is favourable to this government, who could be put on that board. Therefore, it brings up questions, as we have seen being asked in the House most recently, about access for fundraising. Could it be Liberal supporters who go to events and pay $1,500 and hang out with Chinese billionaires? Could it be other people who have worked through the years on the Liberal front who are put on the board? This is a big concern.

Of course, if it was left as it is, as we think it possibly should be, and some of our amendments may deal with this going forward, then it is working, it is working well, and representing the complete country.

It begs the question, why would the government want to redesign it so that all Canadians are not represented? It could be said on this front that this shows incredible disrespect for the provinces and territories. Instead of revising the mandate of the current statistics council and keeping it in full provincial and territorial representation, as it currently provides, the Liberals have chosen to construct a new council to eliminate the feedback from three provinces or territories.

The redesign of the board to create independence brings up other concerns of promises made by the government, which as we have seen lately have basically been altered, either thrown in the garbage bin or arbitrarily overrun, such as the overrun on the promise of $10-billion deficits, now currently sitting at $25 billion.

We question today, as we debate the bill, what really is the purpose of the bill? What is the purpose when we see some of these changes?

Again, it is all about balance. It is all about striking the right balance between collecting data and privacy of Canadians. I will underscore that because there is no doubt about the information that it receives and the importance of work done by Statistics Canada, however, the private lives of Canadians should never be put in jeopardy.

Phil McColeman

Transcript

Government Orders

Discussions (0)