The federal Conservative Party is limiting access to its databases for the duration of the B.C. Conservative Party leadership race after a federal riding association appeared to be using its mailing list to promote a candidate.
The letter from the Conservative Party notified riding associations of the move a day after the Vancouver Centre Conservative Association sent an invitation to a campaign rally for Kerry-Lynne Findlay, a former MP and one of the candidates running to lead the B.C. Conservatives.
The invitation came from the riding association’s e-mail account and used the federal party’s logo.
A copy of the invitation – and the party letter – was obtained by The Globe and Mail and also circulated widely on social media.
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The party’s letter does not explicitly reference the Vancouver Centre e-mail but repeatedly stresses that any data collected, maintained and owned by the Conservative Party of Canada (CPC) can’t be used without an individual’s consent.
“To be clear, it is prohibited to use data collected for the purposes of CPC business for any other reason, including the promotion of any provincial political party, provincial leadership candidate, or similar activities,” wrote Jeremy Hollingsworth, the party’s privacy officer.
“As a precaution, the CPC has taken additional steps to secure access to Party databases until the conclusion of the provincial party leadership election in British Columbia, and the CPC will not hesitate to take further action it deems necessary.”
The president of the Vancouver Centre riding association is listed online as Elaine Allan. She also ran in the riding for the party in the federal election last year.
Ms. Allan and Ms. Findlay have a pre-existing relationship. They are listed as the chair and vice-chair of the advisory board for the Conservative Electors Association, a conservative municipal political party in B.C.
Neither Ms. Allan nor the riding association immediately returned a request for comment.
The Findlay campaign said it did not ask the riding association to send around the invitation. “We respect data privacy and recognize the limits on our own use of data, as our candidate is a former member of Parliament,” the campaign said in an e-mail.
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Accusations that riding associations or political candidates are misusing membership lists aren’t unusual.
In 2017, Conservative Party leadership candidate Brad Trost was fined $50,000 by the party after accusations his leadership campaign gave the list to a firearms organization.
The party was able to levy the fine because Mr. Trost was alleged to have broken the party’s own leadership race rules.
The letter to riding associations from the Conservative Party notes that it follows the guidance from the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada in setting out party rules for how information can be used.
But parties aren’t legally subject to oversight from the commissioner’s office, an issue that’s currently before Parliament.
Last year, the Liberals tacked a provision related to privacy rules for political parties onto an unrelated affordability bill known as C-4.
The measures would amend the Canada Elections Act to explicitly exempt federal parties from provincial privacy laws, and require them to have their own privacy policies.
The amendments are linked to a pending B.C. court case exploring whether federal political parties are subject to that province’s privacy rules.
The three main federal parties argued they are not, but they lost the original case and have since appealed. The bill was tabled just ahead of the appeal being heard.
The government, as well as the political parties, have argued the legislation is about making the jurisdiction over political parties clear.
But privacy and transparency advocates have said the privacy regime provided by the amendments falls far short of what’s needed in an era of big data.
For example, while the parties must have privacy policies, they don’t have to tell Canadians what data they hold on them. Nor is there a legal requirement to report data breaches.
While the proposed amendments sailed through the House of Commons, the Senate has pushed back.
Senators decided to carve out the privacy provisions of C-4 for their own study. The legal and constitutional affairs committee ultimately recommended the privacy provisions be struck entirely, carved out for future study or time limited.
On Tuesday, however, the Senate’s finance committee did not adopt any of those recommendations in its final review of the bill.
But, it agreed to adopt the section “on division,” which signals that section of the bill does not have unanimous consent.
Its report back to the Senate will also include an explanation of committee members’ concerns with the proposed privacy regime, and senators are expected to tack on a formal rebuke to the government over its use of a tax-cut bill for an unrelated matter.