National Post (National Edition)
Privacy commissioner to investigate `shocking' potential breach
Information on dozens of CRA whistleblowers
• The Privacy commissioner will investigate a “shocking” potential privacy breach that made the personal information of dozens of Canada Revenue Agency whistleblowers available to all for months via public court documents.
“Our office has opened an investigation into whether the provisions of the Privacy Act were contravened with respect to this matter,” Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC) spokesperson Vito Pilieci said in a statement to National Post on Tuesday.
The investigation comes as a response to a request from Conservative MP James Bezan last week and on the heels of media reports that private information of dozens of CRA employees who have made allegations against their employer found their way into publicly available documents as part of unrelated legal proceedings at the Federal Court in the winter.
The documents were filed from the government's ethics watchdog for the federal public servants, the Public Sector Integrity Commissioner (PSIC). The documents, which were provided by CRA to PSIC, were filed by the latter in response to a lawsuit from two CRA employees who are asking the federal court to force the PSIC to investigate their claims of harassment from a former superior.
But buried within over 2,000 pages of documents from PSIC and CRA are multiple pages detailing unrelated allegations by whistleblowers who also worked at CRA. Those documents included their names, contact information and even details about their allegations as well as who they targeted.
For example, one document viewed by National Post names three different employees alongside extensive descriptions of their complaints against colleagues or superiors such as harassment, nepotism in staffing decisions or discrimination.
In an interview Tuesday, Bezan said he welcomed the OPC's decision to investigate the matter but said he remains concerned for the whistleblowers whose identities were leaked in the documents. He wants the CRA to guarantee their protection and do everything it can to make sure any copies of the unredacted documents are destroyed and kept out of employees' hands.
“I believe that they need to dig in to find out why this critical, sensitive information was handled carelessly,” Bezan said all the while reiterating that he finds the potential breach “shocking” and “disturbing.”
“However, because it was publicly available, I'm really worried about possible retaliation and retribution against those who have filed complaints,” he added. “If management has already created a toxic work environment, will they be using this information to retaliate against those who file complaints?”
The OPC would not detail Tuesday which parts of federal privacy laws they suspect the PSIC may have broken by disclosing that information publicly, but said the OPC has the power to investigate the publication of personal information by federal government institutions.
A letter from the OPC to Bezan Monday contained a bit more information.
In it, the OPC said it was opening the investigation “based on” both the MP's allegation that the PSIC broke the Privacy Act by releasing “the personal information of Canada Revenue Agency employees who had acted as whistleblowers,” as well media reports that the disclosure also breaches federal public servant whistleblower laws.
Shortly after media began writing about the potential breach, government lawyers wrote to the federal court judge presiding over the case asking that the documents be removed from the public until a redacted version could be filed instead. The judge acquiesced and new documents have since been brought forward by PSIC.
On Tuesday, a spokesperson for the CRA insisted once again that the agency had no choice but to provide the information to the PSIC and had no power over the fact it was then filed publicly in court for all to see.
“The CRA takes the confidentiality of personal, taxpayer and employee information very seriously and, in this case, only disclosed it in response to a legal requirement,” spokesperson Christopher Doody said by email.
The agency did not detail what steps it has since taken to further protect alleged whistleblowers from reprisal or potential consequences since the documents were made public via the federal court.
In a statement, PSIC communications manager Bronwyn Johns-O'Hara promised the office would co-operate fully with the OPC's investigation. PSIC also reiterated its view that handing over the documents to the federal court did not constitute a privacy breach.
“Our view is that there has not been a Privacy Act breach, as the documents were provided to the Court pursuant to an ongoing legal proceeding and in accordance with the rules of the federal court,” Johns-O'Hara added.