Earlier this week, I was invited to appear before the House of Commons Standing Committee on International Trade to discuss the benefits of the Trans Pacific Partnership, a proposed trade agreement involving the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and a handful of other Asian and South American countries. My comments were critical of the proposed agreement as I focused on two issues: copyright and secrecy. The opening comments sparked a lively debate, with the NDP MPs tabling documents I obtained under the Access to Information Act detailing inside access to TPP information for select stakeholders and the Conservative MPs alternately questioning the validity of leaked texts and providing assurances that draft text could change before the final agreement is concluded. I’ll post the transcript once it is available. In the meantime, my opening remarks are posted below.
DANGER INTERNETS AHEAD by Les Orchard (CC BY-NC 2.0) https://flic.kr/p/cSsSX
Online Harms
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The Globe reports that Canada's Human Rights Commission has rejected suggestions that it stop investigating hate messages on the Internet, saying the issue shouldn't be left solely to the Criminal Code. The commission argues that both the criminal code and the Canadian Human Rights Act should be used to deal […]
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