Another step towards totalitarianism

Nov 20, 2014

Privacy is a fundamental right in any healthy democracy. By spying on us and collecting our private information in giant databases, the Harper government is doing enormous damage to Canadian democracy. Peter MacKay’s Online Spying Bill C-13 will enable authorities to monitor the private lives of innocent Canadians, without any real oversight.

It will give telecom providers legal immunity for handing over your private information to the government without a warrant and without any oversight. That means people harmed wouldn’t even have the right to sue. Victims of these privacy breaches wouldn’t even be informed - that means the government could spy on anyone, at any time, and you wouldn’t even know when you’ve been a victim.

The Harper government which includes MP Scott Reid is misleading Canadians when they say Bill C-13 is about cyberbullying. It only includes a couple of pages about cyberbullying, along with 65 pages lifted from Vic Toews’ hugely unpopular spying Bill C-13 which was abandoned after Canadians spoke out against it. That was the one where Toews famously accused anyone who was against the bill was siding with child molesters. 73% of Canadians oppose Bill C-13, with just 15% approving. There is tremendous opposition among all regions, age groups, genders, and income levels. Even Conservative Party supporters oppose Bill C-13 by 62% to 24%.

Scott Reid also voted against Bill C-262 which would have required improvements to the transparency and accountability and provide for an independent review of the operations of the Communications Security Establishment (CSEC). CSEC have recently been found to be using their government funded resources to spy for the private Oil & Gas Industry upon anti-pipeline activists.

The Supreme Court of Canada recently ruled that warrantless government requests for private information are unconstitutional. As things stand, C-13 effectively encourages unconstitutional behaviour.

The Harper government recently cut Parliamentary debate on C-13 short, showing it is running scared of Canadians, including thousands of its own supporters who are speaking out against online spying. The Bill was rammed through the House of Commons and will soon be voted on by the Senate. The Senate used to pride itself on being a chamber of “sober second thought”, and if ever a Bill needed a sober rethink, it is this one.

Get informed and speak out against this insidious Bill C-13. Our cherished principals of freedom and privacy go far beyond simplistic excuses like “I’ve got nothing to hide.”

Patrick Maloney