Bill 55 explained in plain English
Safeguarding our Information Act, 2018
Ontario legislature bill summary, status, timeline, sponsor, votes, and official sources.
At a glance
Official Legislative Assembly of Ontario snapshot for 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. Representative vote breakdowns appear when the Assembly publishes an Ayes and Nays page for the bill.
Our plain-language take, written for civic education.
Source: By PoliticalData.ca
The Safeguarding our Information Act, 2018 requires consumer consent before lenders, consumer reporting agencies, and credit unions can disclose personal information to government institutions.
This bill, called the Safeguarding our Information Act, 2018, makes changes to existing Ontario laws. It requires lenders, consumer reporting agencies, and credit unions to get a consumer's consent before sharing their personal information with a government institution that requests it. This applies even if the government institution is making the request under its lawful authority. The bill also defines 'government institution' to include the Government of Ontario or Canada and their associated bodies, and 'personal information' as defined in the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.
- Amends the Consumer Protection Act, 2002 to require consumer consent for lenders to disclose personal information to government institutions.
- Amends the Consumer Reporting Act to require consumer consent for consumer reporting agencies to disclose information to government institutions.
- Amends the Credit Unions and Caisses Populaires Act, 1994 to require member consent for credit unions to disclose information to government institutions.
- Defines 'government institution' for the purposes of these amendments.
- Specifies that the act comes into force on the day it receives Royal Assent.
- Lenders in Ontario
- Consumers in Ontario
- Consumer reporting agencies in Ontario
- Credit unions in Ontario
- Members of credit unions in Ontario
- Government institutions of Ontario or Canada
- Consumers and members have the right to consent to the disclosure of their personal information to government institutions.
- Lenders, consumer reporting agencies, and credit unions have an obligation to obtain consent before disclosing personal information to government institutions.
- This Act comes into force on the day it receives Royal Assent.
- The bill does not specify what happens if a consumer or member refuses consent.
- The bill does not detail the process by which a government institution would make a request for information.
- The definition of 'personal information' refers to another Act (Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act), so understanding its full scope requires consulting that legislation.
Adds a new section (76.1) stating that lenders can only disclose a consumer's personal information to a government institution if the consumer consents, even if the request is made under lawful authority.
Source: Section 1
Adds new subsections (3) and (4) stating that consumer reporting agencies may only disclose a consumer's information to a government institution if the consumer consents, and defines 'government institution'.
Source: Section 2
Adds new subsections (4) and (5) stating that credit unions may only disclose a member's information to a government institution if the member consents, and defines 'government institution'.
Source: Section 3
Generated using AI from official bill text. Not legal advice. It is written by PoliticalData.ca for civic education, automatically checked and spot-reviewed before publishing.
Official textProcess Snapshot
Vote Summary
This bill is still active. We only show vote counts after the legislature publishes a recorded division.
No published representative vote breakdown
This bill is still moving through the process. When a recorded division is published, representative positions can be listed here.
Official sources
Status, sponsor, votes, and timeline on this page are drawn from these official legislative sources and public records. Each summary above is attributed to its own source.
How this data is sourced