Liberals won’t put parties under privacy laws
OTTAWA — The Liberal government will not impose privacy rules or oversight on federal political parties, rejecting a key recommendation from an allparty committee in the wake of the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica scandal.
The decision means federal political parties can continue to collect, store and use the personal information of Canadian citizens without limitations, laws or independent oversight.
Because they’re specifically exempted from federal privacy laws, parties are also not required to report if they’ve been hacked or suffered a data breach involving sensitive information about Canadians. The Toronto Star has learned the government won’t accept a recommendation — endorsed by MPs from the three major parties on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics Committee — to develop a set of privacy rules for political parties.
Instead, under the Liberals’ electoral rule changes, parties will simply have to post a privacy policy online. Bill C-76 does not allow for any independent oversight, however, to ensure parties are actually following their policies.
“If the government decides to ignore the recommendations from an all-party committee on protecting the privacy rights of Canadians, I find that very disturbing,” said Charlie Angus, the New Democratic vice chair of the committee.
“I also think it would mean that this Liberal government is playing with fire. This study on the privacy rights of Canadians and data happened at the time of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which shows us the power of operators to undermine the democratic processes in countries around the world.”
In exempting political parties from privacy laws, Canada is largely an outlier. The United Kingdom, New Zealand, and much of the European Union subjects parties to privacy rules.
University of Victoria professor Colin Bennett said so long as political parties are not required to implement strong privacy safeguards, there’s a serious risk that Canadians’ personal information could be exposed.
“The political parties have not done a great deal in (creating safeguards),” Bennett, whose research focuses on the social implications of information technology, said Tuesday.
“And particularly troubling in my view is when voter management systems are shared with a whole range of different workers and volunteers at the time of a campaign, (those people) have very little privacy or security training.”
On Monday, federal Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien — along with his provincial and territorial counterparts — issued a joint statement saying it’s “clearly unacceptable” that political parties are exempt from privacy laws.