NDP’s Masse urges a new study of anti-spam bill

NDP industry critic Brian Masse says he wants the Conservatives’ reintroduced spam bill to go through the House legislative process anew to ensure there are no “sleeper clauses.” Industry Minister Tony Clement introduced Bill C-28, the Fighting Internet and Wireless Spam Act, in the House of Commons last week. The bill is similar to its previous version, Bill C-27, the Electronic Commerce Protection Act. It had received 64 amendments in the previous session of Parliament, reaching the Senate Transport and Communications Committee for review before being killed by prorogation. With unanimous consent in the House, Parliament could fast track the government bill, returning it to the Senate committee for consideration. The bill could also be fast tracked by giving it priority at each legislative stage. But Masse told The Wire Report that the reintroduced bill, which has a number of minor amendments, should be studied anew. “It appears on the surface that there hasn’t been dramatic changes to the bill,” he said in an interview. “But we will need to hear from the different interest groups about those changes and to see whether or not the devil is in the details or whether the status quo can remain in this bill.” Masse said the original bill had a sleeper clause allowing companies to “spy” on computers after users had consented to receiving the company’s advertising. “We didn’t discover that until half way through the examination of the bill and we killed that provision. So I’m always a little suspicious in terms of what the government may want to do with this bill because they were very reluctant at first to drop that provision. We want to make sure there are no other sleeper clauses like that,” he said. At a press conference following the bill’s reintroduction last week, Clement said he hoped the legislation could come into force by the end of the year with the support of the opposition parties. “We hope to have this bill force this year, but that entirely depends on the consideration of the House of Commons and the Senate,” he said. Bloc Québécois telecom, science and technology critic Serge Cardin said in an interview that his party generally supports the new bill. “There may be some small changes, but even with these, the Bloc Québécois still has a favourable view of the bill because there are things today on the Internet that poison our lives and that don’t … get consent to send advertising,” he said. “What we deplored at the time was that it took so much time for the bill to arrive, but now it’s here, and it will probably go through the different stages quickly.” Still, Cardin said the new amendments need to be evaluated. “When the Conservatives ask us for something, we have to look at it carefully and analyze the question before answering,” he said. “But since we support it there shouldn’t be any problems to proceed rapidly.” Liberal industry critic Marc Garneau said in an interview that his party would consider fast tracking the bill if the Conservatives issue a request to the parties. He said that the new bill is an improvement on its last version. “We felt C-27 took the approach of being very, very restrictive in order to address the issue of spam, and it was so restrictive that it was actually causing a lot of legitimate activity to be illegal,” he said in an interview. “It looks like they came to their senses because they have recognized there are legitimate activities where there is a need to get access to certain personal information for legitimate reasons ... the look a little bit more reasonable in the sense of going in the right direction.” Masse said the bill was introduced too late to be studied at committee and passed before summer, which will allow stakeholders to lobby on it. “ now going to allow the opponents of the bill to launch out and carry a lobby campaign all over the summer,” he said. Clement said last week that Canada is the only G8 country without anti-spam legislation, and that the country needs to catch up. “Canada is seen as a haven for spammers because of the gaps in our current legislation,” he said. “We’re a place where spammers can reside and inflict their damage throughout the world. We’re an outlier right now, and we’ve got to change that.” kfournier@thewirereport.ca -- CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that a majority vote in the House could fast-track the bill. However this process would require unanimous consent.

NDP’s Masse urges a new study of anti-spam bill

News | May 31, 2010

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