The News Rundown
- The federal government has admitted that it has used cell phone data gathered since Jan. 1, 2019 in order to analyze Canadians' movements during the pandemic, ostensibly to measure the effectiveness of their COVID-19 public health measures.
- The Public Health Agency of Canada acknowledged last month it has been purchasing access to cell phone location data, which has said the data is aggregated and “de-identified” so as to not pinpoint individual usage, but program’s existence nevertheless raised concerns with privacy advocates and opposition politicians, who successfully forced an emergency Commons committee meeting on the issue.
- A spokesperson for Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien confirmed his office has received multiple complaints about the program, and are now looking into how PHAC assured the data could not be used to track individuals.
- Tobi Cohen, a spokesperson for Therrien’s office, said: “We were not asked for advice as to whether the means taken by or on behalf of the government provided adequate safeguards against re-identification. The government relied on other experts to that end, which is their prerogative. Now that we have received complaints alleging violations of privacy, we will turn our attention to the means chosen to de-identify the data mobility information relied upon by the government for public health purposes.”
- This means that although not against the law in any way, the government bypassed the privacy commissioner's office when setting up the program, even though there was the knowledge that gaining access to cell phone information could cause privacy issues.
- The location data is collected through cell towers that mobile devices connect to as Canadians move around their communities. Law enforcement agencies occasionally request such “tower dump” data in the course of criminal investigations. Unlike police, however, PHAC is asking that the supplier remove all identifying information from the data and grant mobile users the ability to opt out of sharing mobility data.
- Though ostensibly to track their own public health measures of the pandemic, it's clear that the PHAC wants to use the data beyond that. Purchased data dated back to January 1st 2019, a full year before the pandemic hit. According to a request for proposals issued in December, PHAC is also looking to extend its analysis of cellphone location data through May 1st 2023 to “understand trends in the movement of populations during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
- According to the proposal, the PHAC wants to use the data to "understand population movement impact on other public health challenges." Even further, it says that “As the COVID-19 pandemic unfolds in Canada and the world, analysis of location data continues to be an important part of the federal response.” It's clear that while using the pandemic as the reason for gaining access, the PHAC wants to continue to use the data going forward, for 'health reasons'.
- The document goes on: “This data when combined with other data sources for analysis can generate important public health insights such as the ability to estimate (the) impact of public health outcomes and risk factors.”
- The House of Commons ethics committee convened in an emergency meeting on Thursday over the matter, and is calling on health minister Jean-Yves Duclos and Canada's chief public health officer, Dr. Theresa Tam to appear before it to answer questions on the policy.
- Conservative, Bloc Quebecois and NDP MPs on the committee have raised concerns about the privacy implications of the policy.
- While this story hasn't been covered that widely, it should raise eyebrows that the government's blatant usage of Canadian's data is not a new thing in this day and age. Teresa Scassa, who researches information law and policy at the University of Ottawa, noted media coverage of PHAC’s program has only focused on the government possessing the information — rather than the fact that private companies collect and sell Canadians’ location data all the time.
- Scassa suggested Canada’s aging privacy laws are insufficient in the age of big data — both for the private sector collecting and using sensitive information for profit, and governments becoming clients of third-party data brokers.
- “There may be perfectly good reasons and justifications for allowing the government to access data that’s been collected by the private sector. But I think we need to have a legislative regime that actually properly addresses the way in which data is now flowing. It’s not just about, you know, setting rules for how government departments collect data from individuals. It’s really about, you know, how big data are acquired, shared, used and what conditions should be set for that (use).”
- So at the end of the day, we live in the information age, where very little of our internet and cell phone information is actually private, and the government sees itself as just one more company wanting to access that information for their own goals. The problem lies in the power that the government has to be able to allow themselves, or any company for that matter, to be able to access that information in the first place.
- If Trudeau's minority government wanted to, they could draft legislation up right away and get at least one of the opposition parties on board. As it stands, we know it's not easy for them to make priorities, and this probably ranks low on the list, due to its lack of flashy media coverage. So, Canadians will be forced to cede control over our digital rights once more, unless something happens to change the government's mind on the matter.
- Supplemental:
- Our final Alberta story of 2021 talked about the impressive growth that our province was seeing.
- Job losses have recovered to pre-2014 resource collapse levels. Oil production sits at 2009 boom levels. And barring a hostile federal natural resources policy Alberta would be soaring higher than we are now.
- The good economic news continues into the new year with Alberta’s tech economy.
- One of the recommendations of the Fair Deal Panel was to take more control over Alberta’s immigration.
- This is similar to what happens in Quebec.
- Alberta is doing just this through a new Accelerated Tech Pathway that will provide a fast track to permanent residence for skilled tech workers.
- The goal with this is to ensure that Alberta will be a top destination for tech investment.
- The province is home to more than 3,000 tech companies and according to a study done by the Alberta Enterprise Corporation, there were just over 1,200 in 2018.
- Between 2018 and 2020, the number of companies with 25 or more e
- employees increased from 13 per cent to 25 per cent.
- These immigration changes are having a ripple effect in Alberta’s post-secondary education system.
- For a long time there’s been a discussion of what sort of post secondary programs make sense and lead to better job prospects.
- SAIT - the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology - is offering a new program where upgrading courses will be offered in its new School for Advanced Digital Technology.
- To start, applicants will create an express entry profile with the Government of Canada.
- Candidates then submit that information and their job offer online to the Alberta government.
- Eligible candidates are then invited to submit an application to Alberta's accelerated program.
- The catch is that at most Alberta can only nominate up to 6,250 people through immigration programs.
- Labour and Immigration Minister Tyler Shandro feels that heading into 2022, Alberta will be facing a labour shortage and the government is proactively using this program to address that and more announcements are on the way.
- Irfhan Rawji, founder and CEO of Calgary-based MobSquad, said the new program will make Alberta the easiest place in the country to bring technology professionals to, in particular, “This accelerated pathway in Alberta is a competitive advantage for this province. It’ll help support the momentum of the tech innovation ecosystem, and allow us to attract highly talented workers here.”
- Labour mobility when combined with areas that make business start ups easy often do well.
- Alberta’s UCP government has been focused on jobs and the economy primarily, in their first session they focused heavily on reducing red tape and now comes the focus on increasing labour mobility.
- This is what a government focused on economic growth and development looks like.
- With the pandemic hopefully in the rear view mirror soon, one can really begin to ask, did Alberta have the best pandemic economic management strategy?
- Supplementals:
- A British Columbia Liberal leadership candidate says he called for an audit of party memberships before the Feb. 5 leadership vote after reviewing data that raised questions about new members.
- Val Litwin said he sent a letter to the party last month outlining concerns after his campaign reviewed data that included people giving an address on their membership application in areas where there are no homes. Litwin would not release the letter he sent to the party but he said party officials have been in contact with his campaign team about membership issues and he's hopeful the concerns can be resolved before next month's vote.
- Litwin said: “When you see an address that is on a forest service road that actually doesn't have a house, a place of residence on it, that's a flag. We're seeing it in the analysis of the data and the membership details themselves. We need to get to the bottom of it. I have confidence we can get through this, but as a candidate who's been casting a vision for change, and for the B.C. Liberals to become a modern and relevant party, it starts with our behaviour.”
- Litwin is one of seven candidates vying to replace former leader Andrew Wilkinson, who resigned following the October 2020 election that saw Premier John Horgan's New Democrats re-elected with a majority.
- A statement from Roxanne Helme and Colin Hansen, co-chairs of the party's election organizing committee, said Thursday that 2,644 memberships “remain flagged for further followup to confirm their membership information before they will be permitted to register to vote.” The party has about 43,000 members in total.
- A statement earlier this week from Helme and Hansen says the criteria used to identify memberships for review are based on several objective measures, including missing email addresses and phone numbers, credit cards that don't match the member's name or address, and overuse of a single internet protocol address.
- At the same time, the party is being accused of singling out members from the South Asian and Chinese communities for review and audit.
- On one side, warning about the potential damage to the party’s reputation, are six of the seven leadership candidates — MLAs Ellis Ross, Michael Lee, and Renee Merrifield, as well as outsiders Val Litwin, Stan Sipos, and Gavin Dew.
- On the other side is Kevin Falcon, the former cabinet minister and presumed frontrunner whose organizers boast that they “sold more memberships” than the other candidates, and did so in the South Asian community.
- Falcon wrote on his Twitter: “I’ve dedicated over 20 years of my life proudly working in the Asian/South Asian communities and will not tolerate those members being singled out to prove their membership adequacy. In this day and age, it is completely unacceptable for a party to single out members of racialized communities for their involvement in politics.”
- Ellis Ross denied that he and the others were targeting South Asians for unfair scrutiny. He wrote on his Twitter: “However, we are singling out campaign teams that don’t follow the rules, and we won’t stop. The B.C. Liberal party IS a tolerant, diverse and multicultural organization,” continued Ross, the former chief councillor of the Haisla Nation. “That’s why I’m here. Stop suggesting otherwise.”
- Adding to the mix was former B.C. Liberal MLA Jas Johal, now the host of the afternoon show on radio station CKNW. He wrote on his Twitter, in a long rant that explains why he went back to broadcasting instead of staying in the party or running for leadership himself: “The B.C. Liberals are a rural rump of a party, with the demographics of 1970s Canada. They should ask themselves how they got here. Do you think this would have been an issue if 20,000 British Columbians of European descent had been signed up?”
- Piling on at the expense of the Liberals were the governing New Democrats. NDP MLA Niki Sharma said: “I urge the B.C. Liberal party to take these allegations seriously and send the allegations to a credible third party so they can be subject to an independent investigation.”
- Of course, the New Democrats themselves refused to have an arms-length review when similar membership allegations roiled their party in the 2000 and 2011 leadership races.
- As it happened in 2011, the Liberals were also picking a new leader and they, too, found themselves embroiled in membership controversies. The most memorable involved a house cat named Olympia, which was added to the Liberal membership rolls after someone paid the $10 fee. When it came out that the cat belonged to a supporter of Christy Clark, a rival campaign started a website called Kitties4Christy. The site was soon shut down, along with the cat’s membership. Clark went on to win.
- Also back in 2011, then-NDP MLA Harry Lali called for Elections B.C. to take charge of leadership contests for all parties under fair, accountable and independent guidelines. Elections B.C. would be well-positioned to do so because it already conducts independent audits of party finances and by-mail voting in referendums and elections. But it would need a change of legislation, something that the Liberals did not undertake when they were in government.
- Nor have the New Democrats done so now that they are in a position to enlist Elections B.C. to oversee leadership races. Embarrassments notwithstanding, neither party is willing to surrender control over the insider-controlled process that selects leaders, some of whom go on to become premiers.
- While the parties continue to hide their membership processes, and obfuscate any wrongdoing in leadership processes, people will continue to feel disillusioned by provincial politics. As we move forward, it's clear that BC needs to govern itself better, or we risk becoming a province that is increasingly untenable to be proud of.
- Supplementals:
Firing Line
- Nearly two years ago at the start of the pandemic Canadians were greeted with toilet paper shortages amongst other things.
- Recently we’ve been met with delays of getting products internationally via ship due to the sheer volume of products being ordered in.
- People were ordering so many things that were coming via ship that there were too many containers blocking the ports causing a supply chain crunch.
- But the next supply chain crunch will be caused by the combined ineptitude of the Trudeau and Biden administrations.
- Starting on January 15 truckers who are unvaccinated will no longer be allowed into Canada and on January 22, unvaccinated truckers will no longer be allowed into the United States.
- Alongside healthcare workers many saw truckers as heroes as well early on the pandemic to the point where restaurants closed to sit-down dining were opened for truckers.
- The Canadian Trucking Alliance estimates that 10-15% of their workers are unvaccinated which means that just Canada wide, an estimated 12,000 Canadian truckers would be taken off the road with thousands more in the US.
- Other estimates say that up to 26,000 truckers could be sidelined as the result of these new mandates.
- It’s also not just that these people won’t be able to make cross border trips, anyone who does, will have to be quarantined and in the eyes of the federal government, that does not include the cab of a truck - where many truckers live most of the year.
- On Wednesday there was some confusion as to whether or not the federal government had made a decision to reverse this policy but no, the vaccine mandate is still going forward.
- There was a statement released by the federal government indicating that the mandate would be put on hold but later the government said that statement was released in error.
- Mike Millian, President of the Private Motor Truck Council of Canada said, "It's created a whole disaster. Governments are supposed to provide clarity and calmness, and what has gone on ... provided nothing but chaos and confusion.”
- Why is this a big deal you might ask?
- Every good that you see on a shelf in a store arrives at that store via truck. What’s more, the majority of goods that cross the US-Canada border are also sent by truck.
- More than two thirds of the annual $650b CDN traded between Canada and the US travels by truck. This is more than everyone’s fresh fruit and veggies from the pacific northwest and California.
- The government is pressing ahead on this because they estimate that only 5% of drivers will be estimated but as we discussed earlier, the trucking companies feel this amount will be closer to 10-15% whereas some in the US say as high as 20%.
- And following supply shortages the next step in the economic chain is price increases. This combined with high inflation will raise sticker prices further for Canadians.
- In November food prices rose 4.7% by the year earlier, this will go higher if this mandate goes forward.
- For comparison sake of how this is happening in the US, the Biden administration wants truck companies with more than 100 drivers to be vaccinated or submit to weekly testing - this is being challenged in the Supreme Court.
- In Canada this story seems to have flown under the radar and is only really being talked about by the opposition.
- For a moment it appeared sanity had reached the cabinet and Prime Minister’s Office on this issue but unless something changes in the next hours, the trucker vaccine mandate is going forward.
- Supplementals:
Word of the Week
Aggregate - a singular grouping of a combination of many separate and often differing things, people or ideas.
Quote of the Week
"It's created a whole disaster. Governments are supposed to provide clarity and calmness, and what has gone on ... provided nothing but chaos and confusion.” - Mike Millian, President of the Private Motor Truck Council of Canada on the Government of Canada’s trucker vaccine mandate
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Show Data
Episode Title: An Aggregate of Controversy
Teaser: The feds admit they purchased Canadians’ cell phone data, Alberta looks to attract tech talent through immigration, and the BC Liberal leadership race isn’t short on controversy. Also, unvaccinated truckers will soon be unable to cross the US/CAN border.
Recorded Date: January 14, 2022
Release Date: January 16, 2022
Duration: 54:48
Edit Notes: Cough and WOTW mixup
Podcast Summary Notes
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