e-7237

Petition to the House of Commons

• Testimony from privacy regulators and experts before the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs identified significant regulatory gaps in the oversight of political party data practices in the Canada Elections Act as amended under Bill C-4, Part 4 as referenced in the committee’s report;
• Regulators warned that political parties remain shielded from the level of independent enforcement, transparency, auditing and access rights required of other organizations across Canadian society;
• Legislation governing personal information by political parties operating year round must equally protect the democratic rights of Canadians year round and not just during the election period and should avoid entrenching regulatory advantages for political parties themselves;
• The recent proposed amendments allow political parties to operate under weaker privacy accountability standards than those imposed on citizens, businesses, and civil society organizations; and
• Democratic confidence is damaged when those who write the rules for elections exempt themselves from the standards expected of everyone else.