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New Reports

Where Should the Green Choices Be Made

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) and Privacy: Shopping into Surveillance

Description of Organization and Areas of Law:

The Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) was federally incorporated in 1976 as a non-profit corporation in 1976 and has charitable status for tax purposes. The organization’s purpose is to provide representation, research and advocacy on behalf of those elements of the public interest that would otherwise be unable to be adequately heard before courts, tribunals, and decision-makers. PIAC has tried to focus its mandate on issues arising from the delivery of important public services including telecommunications, energy, financial services, and transportation. PIAC seeks to represent and advocate on behalf of ordinary consumers, in particular vulnerable consumers, concerning the rates, policies, rules and regulations associated with the delivery of these services with a view to ensuring principles of access and affordability and fair treatment for the constituencies it tries to serve.

PIAC’s work takes a variety of forms. First, the lawyers of PIAC represent organizations whose membership serves our target constituencies before boards and tribunals where the industries delivering such services are regulated, These organizations include the National Anti-Poverty Organization (NAPO), the Vulnerable Energy Consumers Coalition, the Consumers Association of Canada, the Ontario Council of Senior Citizens Organizations, Union de Consommateurs, and Rural Dignity of Canada among others. PIAC’s most significant commitments for such representation occur before the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission and the Ontario Energy Board where PIAC lawyers will be full participants in administrative proceedings including the presentation of evidence, cross-examination of witnesses and the making of submissions.

Because the delivery of the public services touches upon consideration of other important legal and policy matters, PIAC has also developed expertise and is frequently involved in funded and unfunded work (approximately 20% of PIAC’s work is unfunded) representing its constituencies in competition law and practice, electronic commerce, privacy, multilateral agreements, and general issues of consumer protection.

PIAC carries out its work outside the hearing room in numerous ways. Its extensive studies and reports associated with the above are published and distributed to policy makers and the general public through its web site. PIAC staff participate in discussions with government officials, other industry stakeholders, other public interest communities, as well as groups representing its own constituencies to attempt to secure rights, rules, policies or consensus that will advance the interests of the communities that PIAC serves. PIAC frequently attends before parliamentary and legislative committees to pursue these same goals in legislation. Finally, PIAC’s staff are active in attempting to present in the media, a coherent defense of those communities’ position when the delivery of important public services are in issue.