May 21, 2026 – BC Freedom of Information and Privacy Association (FIPA) thanks the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs (LCJC) for the opportunity to provide a submission on the proposed Bill C-25. For more information on Bill C-25 and its implications for voter privacy, see how Information misuse puts you at risk. We also encourage people to sign the House of Commons Petition on C-25 E-7237.
The following submission was drafted by Ryan Rutley, Pascale Grenier, and Sara Mateika and submitted to the committee.
FIPA’s submission to the LCJC largely mirrors its submission to PROC on Bill C-25 (C-25 PROC Submission ). To provide a brief overview, FIPA founded its recommendations on the view that the changes to the Canada Elections Act proposed by Bill C-25 do not go far enough to protect the personal information of Canadian voters. It highlighted the fact that, while Bill C-25 increases the regulations concerning party’s internal privacy policies, it fails to make them answerable to an external statutory regime, such as those that businesses and public bodies must abide by.
Importantly, FIPA’s recommendations were supported by the increasing developments in Alberta regarding the breach of the List of Electors. It has now been confirmed that at least 600 people have accessed the list, with investigations suggesting it could be thousands. This provides a case study exemplary of the points FIPA wanted to emphasize in this submission. Voter’s personal information is highly sensitive, as it can be utilized in disinformation campaigns, to profile voters, and other misuses which undermine the public’s confidence in our democratic institutions. The importance of maintaining the security of this information only grows at the federal level, where voter data bases hold the data of citizens across the country.
The importance of adequate regulation of a political party’s use of personal information is evidenced by these events. They bring to light the consequences of a lack of independent oversight and non-universal information managment rules. Bill C-25 does not address these issues. It preserves the authority of a party’s internal privacy policy, rather than imposing an external statutory regime with the ability to regulate more strictly. It is FIPA’s position that more intensive regulation, that which we don’t see reflected in Bill C-25, is required.
FIPA thanks the LCJC for the opportunity to submit and will continue to advocate for the privacy protection of voters and transparency within the Canadian political system.
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