SoVote

Mrs. Rachael Thomas (Lethbridge, CPC)

Apr/9/24 3:17:08 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I rise on the question of privilege raised by the member for Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola. The question of privilege concerns a clear and potentially intentional omission of facts from a recently answered Order Paper question known as Question No. 1445. It would appear the government has acted irresponsibly and violated parliamentary procedure, therefore breaching trust. In a question I sent to the government, I asked the Prime Minister's Office to outline when the government asked social media to take down content. This is commonly referred to as censorship. The government sent me an answer on the many times it had done this, but apparently this was only partially true, because there were omissions made. On Friday, April 5, Allen Sutherland, an assistant secretary to the cabinet in the Privy Council Office, testified at the public inquiry on foreign interference. During his testimony, Mr. Sutherland revealed that in 2019 the Privy Council Office had asked Facebook to take down a post about the Prime Minister from the Buffalo Chronicle. He also mentioned that Facebook had honoured the request, leading to the removal of the content from the platform. This is why I add to the question of privilege. This request for a takedown was not reported in the answer to the question I sent to the government, which means that there was clearly an omission made. I asked the government to report on its content takedown requests from 2016 onward, and I listed Facebook as one of the platforms I wanted to know about. There was a clear omission from my Order Paper question and the answer I received, which has failed to satisfy its purpose in providing the truth based on what I had asked. This is a major concern, and it undermines trust in the institution in which electors place their confidence. How can we operate as a parliamentary democracy if the government cannot be trusted to answer questions from the official opposition, especially on matters of censorship? Mr. Speaker, it is awfully loud in here. I have put up with it for quite some time, but perhaps you could bring that down.

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Context: House Hansard - 296 - Apr/9/24

Mr. Arnold Viersen

Apr/9/24 5:47:55 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-63

Madam Speaker, Bill C-63 has no criminal offences around the uploading of this kind of content. In this bill, it would be a criminal offence to upload. We want to make sure this content never hits the Internet. A 24-hour takedown period is not good enough. We want to ensure that companies are doing their due diligence to ensure that their content is of people who are of age and that people consent to it. An important piece of this bill is also that, if somebody has made a written request saying they revoke their consent, immediately that content must come down.

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Context: House Hansard - 296 - Apr/9/24

Mr. Arnold Viersen

Apr/9/24 5:51:05 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am happy to support that initiative. I would say we can do both of these things. This bill is to try to prevent, in the first place, any of this content from being uploaded, rather than trying to deal with the mess after the fact. What the member is suggesting is more about dealing with something after it has been uploaded. That is an important aspect. Bringing the people who upload this content to justice is an important piece, but this would be put in place to prevent the uploading of this content in the first place.

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