It's In P.E.I, too

PE: Privacy commissioner declares PNP list to be private
By Teresa Wright, Transcontinental Media

Source: The Guardian, June 4, 2010

[CHARLOTTETOWN, PE] — The province’s acting privacy commissioner has ruled the list of businesses that benefitted from the Provincial Nominee Program will not be made public.

A number of media and members of the public requested the list of businesses that received PNP funds, called units, through the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy (FOIPP) Act.

Judy Haldemann, acting information and privacy commissioner, released her decision on these requests this morning. She received numerous submissions from businesses who said they made their applications under an expectation of confidentiality. They also argued they would suffer harm from the release of the information.

Haldemann said she agreed with this and concluded they should be protected.

“I am persuaded by the arguments of the third parties that the majority of (them) would suffer significant harm to their business if any information about their involvement in PNP were to be made public,” Haldemann wrote in her decision. “It became clear to me after reading these submissions that a large number of third parties were suffering from an entirely reasonable and foreseeable prospect of significant harm to their business if their participation in PNP was ‘found out’.

“In respect of damage to the business interests and reputations of Third Parties in the communities in which they do business, I find that the Third Parties’ arguments are cogent and compelling evidence of such harm under clause 14(1)(c) of the FOIPP Act.”