"Bill C-22 builds the blanket model of data retention that the European courts have consistently rejected, as it would require providers to retain, for up to a year, the date, time, duration, origin of communications, and location of the devices involved. The result is a surveillance map of the movements and communications practices of virtually all Canadians for a year, the very opposite of what recognizing privacy as a fundamental right envisions." From @mgeist.

https://mas.to/@mgeist/116691913037603373

#C22 #FediLaw #CanPoli

Do I want to inflict clause-by-clause on myself? It's a miserable experience at the best of times, trying to figure out what an amendment to a bill that amends an act actually does.

https://parlvu.parl.gc.ca/Harmony/en/PowerBrowser/PowerBrowserV2/20260604/-1/45519

Jenny Kwan proposes the first amendment, despite not being a regular member of the committee (because the NDP doesn't have enough MPs to merit a permanent spot).

And then immediately into a Conservative point of order on briefs that have yet to be distributed. The Liberal Chair evades a direct answer. A different Conservative asks if the (non-partisan) Clerk has a ballpark answer on how many briefs are outstanding. The Chair declines to let the Clerk take the mic.

Gross. So gross.

Some discussion of the difference between storing information on one’s phone versus the cloud. Negative a hundred points to the DoJ for assuming a hypothetical judge is necessarily a "he.”

Discussion of amendments getting slightly derailed because the witness didn't have copies of the amendments. Good thing we're rushing this shit.

The Bloc points out that the witnesses are specifically there from the pro-surveillance camp, not the privacy camp. Every answer from their perspective is “your proposed amendments to Bill C-22 as the government drafted it would make it harder for police.”

First voice vote fails (on an amendment apparently recommended by the Privacy Commissioner). 6 no, 5 yes. C'est comme ça.

Conservative echoing the Bloc that the witnesses are here to "give more access to law enforcement," not to balance that with Canadians' Charter right to privacy.

I think we're still (after an hour and a half) on clause 4. The bill has 48 clauses. The most controversial is 41. Seems unlikely they'll get through by 6:30.

Sunday morning, currently no indication on the SECU website of when the next clause-by-clause meeting on #C22 will be held (parl.ca/secu). (Probably Tuesday.)

The most recent meeting for which there are published minutes and a transcript is May 7, a month ago. This means they're doing clause-by-clause without minutes, without transcripts, and without submitted briefs and objections.

I'm musing about a letter to whatever Senate Committee ends up studying this, pointing out that they don't have to legitimize this farce. They can, this chamber of sober second thought, insist on a bare minimum Parliamentary standard of democracy and respect for official languages and Charter rights. Apparently it's as easy as splitting the bill.

What fun that would be for historians, if the independent senators declined to endorse a police state. At the very least they could slow it down a bit.

Ah, the blessing of having friends you can send questions to like "are you able to spit up examples of the Senate splitting a bill"?

Yup! C-103 from 1998 (the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency / Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation) and C-10 from 2002 (firearms / cruelty to animals).

Procedurally it looks like a motion that happens when the bill gets referred from the Senate to committee for study. It could be that if the bill gets sent to committee whole then a motion to split the bill *at* committee would be considered out of order. So that helps establish timeline.

@cargot_robbie Reasonable grounds to suspect versus reasonable grounds to believe? It's... yeah. A distinction in law.

I would say it's not unusual to decline to hear from more witnesses when they've reached clause-by-clause already. (The witnesses that are at the table now are supposed to help with understanding the bill, not give new evidence.)