Supplement to Statistics Canada's Generic Privacy Impact Assessment related to the Canadian Correctional Services Survey (CCSS)

Date: March 2023

Program manager: Director, Canadian Centre for Justice and Community Safety Statistics
Director General, Health, Justice, Diversity, and Population

Reference to Personal Information Bank (PIB)

The Canadian Correctional Services Survey was originally considered covered by the Justice Research bank (StatCan PPU 028), however given the expanded nature of the survey and sensitivity of the personal information being collected, a new bank is being requested.

In accordance with the Privacy Act, Statistics Canada is submitting a new institutional personal information bank (PIB) to describe any personal information obtained from the Canadian Correctional Services Survey, for the purposes of the Statistics Act. The following PIB is proposed for review and registration.

Canadian Correctional Services Survey (CCSS)

Description: This bank describes information that is obtained from federal and provincial/territorial correctional services programs in Canada on adults and youth being supervised by correctional services. Personal information may include name, date of birth, sex, Indigenous identity, visible minority group, municipality, postal code, social insurance number, fingerprint section identification number, provincial/territorial health insurance number and provincial/territorial driver's license number.

Class of Individuals: Adults and youth being supervised by provincial/territorial or federal correctional services programs in Canada.

Purpose: The personal information is used to produce statistical data and analyses at a disaggregated level on the federal, provincial/territorial populations supervised under correctional services in Canada. Personal information is collected pursuant to the Statistics Act (Sections 3, 7, 13, 22 (d)).

Consistent Uses: Subject to Statistics Canada's Directive on Microdata Linkage, information on adults and youth being supervised by correctional services may be combined with the Census of Population and the National Household Survey for disaggregated data evaluation, with data on the military veteran population, as well as with key health datasets to better understand the prevalence of mental health issues in the correctional population. Furthermore, CCSS data will be used to produce counts of residents in correctional facilities for the Census of Population collective dwelling counts.

Retention and Disposal Standards: Information is retained until it is no longer required for statistical purposes and then it is destroyed.

RDA Number: 2018/001

Related Record Number: StatCan CCJ 135

TBS Registration: To be assigned by TBS

Bank Number: StatCan PPU 023

Description of statistical activity

Under the authority of the Statistics Act^{Footnote 1}, Statistics Canada's Canadian Centre for Justice and Community Safety Statistics (CCJCSS) conducts the Canadian Correctional Services Survey (CCSS), an administrative data^{Footnote 2} survey that collects microdata on adults and youth electronically from correctional services programs in Canada. The objective of the survey is to be a source of national information on corrections, which is directly related to the mandate of the CCJCSS of providing information to the justice community and the public on the nature and extent of crime and victimization and the administration of criminal and civil justice in Canada.

The CCJCSS is the focal point of a federal-provincial-territorial partnership for the collection of justice information in Canada. This partnership, known as the National Justice Statistics Initiative (NJSI), is composed of representatives of the federal, provincial and territorial governments responsible for the administration of justice in Canada, and Statistics Canada. Development of the CCSS was guided by the NJSI to fill data needs and inform federal and provincial policy makers in the field of justice and public safety, managers of correctional services programs, researchers, academics and the public, on key indicators related to the correctional population.

One of the most important needs is information related to repeated involvement with the criminal justice system, a key justice priority identified by Deputy Ministers responsible for Justice and Public Safety, as well as other policy makers and justice administrators. To respond to this need, Public Safety Canada and the CCJCSS developed an ongoing pan-Canadian program of repeated contact – or "re-contact" – with the criminal justice system. The CCSS contributes the correctional services information needed for this program. In addition, recent consultation through the Engagement on Corrections Representation Data and Analysis Strategy involved respondents from a wide and diverse range of perspectives, including: Indigenous and racialized groups and organizations; corrections agencies; academics; and other interested parties at the national and provincial/teritorial government levels. The Engagement identified the need for Statistics Canada to develop population-based indicators and re-contact indicators using disaggregated data to measure representation of sub-populations in correctional systems, as well as the need to further analyze relationships between socio-economic and mental health issues and over-representation. The CCSS is the only high-quality source of information on individuals under supervision within the correctional system that can be combined with information on the general population to provide these indicators and allow analysis of these critical justice issues to meet data needs.

Statistics Canada began development of the CCSS in 2014 and began collection in 2016. The survey is currently implemented in six jurisdictions: Newfoundland and Labrador (youth corrections only), Nova Scotia, Ontario (adult corrections only), Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. The CCJCSS is now expanding the coverage of the survey to include the remaining provincial and territorial correctional services, as well as federal correctional services. These stakeholders are:

• Newfoundland and Labrador Justice and Public Safety
• Prince Edward Island Community and Correctional Services
• New-Brunswick Public Safety
• Ministère de la sécurité publique du Québec
• Ministère de la santé et des services sociaux du Québec
• Ontario Children Community and Social Services- youth division
• Manitoba Justice - Corrections
• Yukon Correctional Services
• Yukon Health and Social Services
• Northwest Territories Department of Justice, Corrections Service
• Nunavut Justice - Corrections
• Correctional Service Canada

To achieve the survey's objective, Statistics Canada collects personal information on individuals under correctional supervision across the country including:

• direct identifiers of persons supervised by corrections (where available and agreed to by the correctional program):
  • name
  • aliases
  • address (postal code)
  • date of birth
  • Social Insurance Number
  • FPS-CPIC number
  • Driver's Licence Number
  • Health Insurance Number
• demographic information of persons being supervised (e.g., sex, Indigenous identity, racialized group)
• their legal hold status while in correctional services
• offences and conditions related to various court orders
• events related to the person that occur during the period of supervision
• results of any needs assessments done on persons while in correctional services.

The CCSS provides information to the public, media, academics and researchers on trends in correctional services, as well as demographic information on the population under correctional supervision in Canada. Survey results, including information on admissions to correctional services as well as the number of persons supervised by correctional services and their characteristics, are published annually in a series of data tables on the Statistics Canada website. In addition, special topic analyses in Juristat^{Footnote 3} publications as well as record linkage studies using CCSS data explore key issues facing the criminal justice system. Expanding coverage of the CCSS means that these measures and analyses can be produced at the national level, meeting the data needs and gaps currently identified by provincial/territorial and federal justice stakeholders.

To-date, linkage of the CCSS to internal statistical databases, more specifically linkage of the CCSS to the Census of Population and the National Household Survey for disaggregated data evaluation, as well as linkage to the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR2) Survey and the Integrated Criminal Court Survey (ICCS) to study re-contact with the criminal justice system, have been undertaken. Statistics Canada's microdata linkage and related statistical activities were assessed in Statistics Canada's Generic Privacy Impact Assessment.^{Footnote 4} All data linkage activities are subject to established governance^{Footnote 5}, and are assessed against the privacy principles as well as necessity and proportionality^{Footnote 6}. All approved linkages are published on Statistics Canada's website^{Footnote 7}.

Analytical files will be used by Statistics Canada to produce non-confidential aggregate statistical tables and analytical reports, such as reports for Juristat. Anonymized CCSS analytical files, as well as integrated corrections and criminal court data will also be placed in Statistics Canada's Research Data Centres (RDCs)^{Footnote 8} to facilitate research on key justice issues such as re-contact, within a secure research environment. Confidentiality vetting guidelines specific to the CCSS will be developed to prevent the release of potentially sensitive information that pertains to the characteristics of a particular individual. Researchers must become deemed employees of Statistics Canada to access the files in the RDCs. Additionally, access will only be granted once a research proposal has been approved.

Future plans under consideration also include linkage with data on the military veteran population, as well as linkage with other datasets via the Social Data Linkage Environment (SDLE)^{Footnote 9} to explore issues relevant to the justice community (for example, the prevalence of mental health issues in the correctional population). Furthermore, CCSS data will be used to produce counts of residents in correctional facilities for the Census of Population collective dwelling counts^{Footnote 10}.

Reason for supplement

While the Generic Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) addresses most of the privacy and security risks related to statistical activities conducted by Statistics Canada, this supplement was developed due to the breadth (both in terms of the number of variables being collected as well as the expanded jurisdictional coverage) and overall sensitivity of the personal information being requested with relation to the affected individuals. Further, personal information collection includes youth, which further raises the sensitivity level of the collection of personal information. As is the case with all PIAs, Statistics Canada's privacy framework ensures that elements of privacy protection and privacy controls are documented and applied.

Necessity and Proportionality

The use of personal information for the activity can be justified against Statistics Canada's Necessity and Proportionality Framework:

1. Necessity: Information from the CCSS informs correctional services programs on the need for and development of programming to address specific needs (i.e., physical and mental health of persons under correctional supervision, rehabilitation and treatment programs,) as well as manage facility capacity and case flow – resulting in many potential and direct benefits to the covered populations.

   Statistics Canada requires the personal information to produce accurate information on the correctional population in Canada to fulfill the agency's statistical mandate, and specifically to produce valuable demographic information at a disaggregated level on the federal, provincial and territorial populations supervised under correctional services. The CCSS national data requirements (i.e., survey variables) were developed in consultation with the National Justice Statistics Initiative (NJSI), the federal-provincial-territorial partnership for the collection of information on the nature and extent of crime and the administration of civil and criminal justice in Canada.

   In 2021, Statistics Canada also engaged numerous partners of interest, including Indigenous and racialized community groups and organizations, and sought input through the Engagement on Corrections Representation Data and Analysis Strategy, on the development of its statistical program, including the CCSS. The engagement identified several data needs, notably including the need for Statistics Canada to develop population-based indicators and re-contact indicators using disaggregated data to measure representation of sub-populations in correctional systems, as well as the need to further analyze relationships between socio-economic and mental health issues and over-representation.

   The CCSS allows for the development of these indicators, as well as record linkage opportunities to meet these research needs. For example, information on offender characteristics collected by the CCSS, such as sex, Indigenous identity and racialized group, allows the integration of corrections and population statistics to create population-based metrics needed to address issues such as the overrepresentation of certain groups (e.g., Indigenous peoples and the Black population) within correctional services programs across the country.

   Furthermore, concerns related to the overrepresentation of Indigenous and racialized individuals in the Canadian criminal justice system reveal important gaps in the availability of disaggregated data^{Footnote 11}. Full CCSS coverage allows the disaggregation of data and the ability to study socio-economic factors impacting overrepresentation, such as mental health, substance use, homelessness, income, and education, not only within correctional services, but within the broader social and justice systems. CCSS data can help inform correctional services programs on the need for and development of programming to address specific needs of those involved under correctional supervision, for example mental health needs, rehabilitation and treatment programming, as well as programs aimed at successful community integration.

   The personal identifiers collected by the CCSS enable record linkage of CCSS data with key health administrative datasets (such as Vital Statistics, National Ambulatory Care Reporting System and the Discharge Abstract Database) to better understand, for example, re-contact, overrepresentation, and the prevalence of mental health issues in the correctional population. This information is needed to meet the data gaps and needs identified by Deputy Ministers responsible for Justice and Public Safety, as well as other policy makers and justice stakeholders including all provincial, territorial and federal correctional services programs in Canada. Insight from the CCSS provides the social and economic context of the correctional population and allows evidence-based decision making. The full national picture of the correctional system, needed for comprehensive re-contact analysis for example, is only possible with the participation of all jurisdictions in the CCSS. Full coverage allows for analysis of all provincial, territorial and federal jurisdictions which is most relevant to all Canadians.

2. Effectiveness - Working assumptions:This iteration to expand coverage of the CCSS allows more consistent and accurate data across all jurisdictions. Given that the CCSS was previously in collection, Statistics Canada has validated the effectiveness of collecting this information directly from institutions to generate statistics on the correctional services population. The current iteration is now expanding the collection to increase the coverage of the dataset, and thus the effectiveness of the insights being derived from it.

   The personal information being collected and linked from existing databases will be used to enhance the analytical capacity to examine the total federal and provincial/territorial correctional populations at a national level once full coverage is achieved. In addition, as more jurisdictions implement the CCSS, more correctional populations across regions can be studied in a more comprehensive manner and be better understood, raising the quality of the analysis of the CCSS as a whole.

   New insights derived from the inclusion of the entire federal and provincial/territorial correctional population in the CCSS will improve traditional indicators to report on disaggregated data, such as producing incarceration rates by Indigenous identity and racialized group. It will also provide more relevant indicators, like re-contact of sentenced individuals after release, to meet the needs of justice stakeholders.

3. Proportionality: The CCSS collects direct identifiers such as name, address and date of birth of individuals under correctional supervision, as well as demographic characteristics and information relating to their periods of supervision (e.g., their legal hold status, offence and event information). The direct identifiers captured by the CCSS are critical to the proposed record linkage studies. These direct identifiers will be sent to the linkage team to establish linkages with other Statistics Canada datasets.

   Only the variables required to achieve the statistical goals of the survey will be requested in order to mitigate potential impacts to the privacy of the affected individuals under correctional supervision. All data collected by the CCSS are considered the minimum data required to address the data needs and gaps identified by Deputy Ministers, the NJSI, and other partners and stakeholders through the Engagement on Corrections Representation Data and Analysis Strategy.

   Standard best practices with respect to administrative data collection and publication will be followed. Personal identifiers will be removed from the analytical file as soon as operationally feasible and in keeping with Statistics Canada's practices, as outlined in the agency's Generic PIA^{Footnote 12}. The public benefits of the research findings are expected to inform policies and lead to positive changes within correctional services and programs in Canada.

   The CCSS data help fill the need to inform evidence-driven approaches to crime prevention and programs aimed at reducing recidivism, as well as programs designed for rehabilitation, community integration, and public safety. In addition, population-based measures and overrepresentation indicators derived from the CCSS are beneficial to design culturally appropriate programs, address inequities, and engage with communities in a meaningful way. These measures and analyses, as well as the capacity for data disaggregation, are only possible with the use of the personal information collected by the CCSS. The potential benefits and positive changes to social and justice-related programs and services are believed to be proportional to the overall risks to privacy.

4. Alternatives: Asking for information that has already been captured in administrative data from the jurisdictions and then subsequently through linkage to other administrative data sources would be extremely burdensome and likely of much lower quality, especially in accuracy due to recall errors. Overall, survey collection from individuals is not recommended over administrative data collection and subsequent microdata linkage, as it is the only method to identify the profile of individuals in terms of understanding social, economic, health, and demographic trends related to the correctional population.

   Administrative data from the federal, provincial and territorial correctional services programs in Canada represent the only practical and accurate source of information to collect and meet the national data requirements of the CCSS approved by the National Justice Statistics Initiative in 2014.

   The foundation for the CCSS is an older legacy survey, the Integrated Correctional Services Survey (ICSS), which also collects correctional services microdata for select jurisdictions. However, several socio-demographic variables in the ICSS (e.g., Indigenous status, employment status and educational attainment) do not meet current statistical standards and the personal identifiers collected are insufficient to undertake record linkage with other administrative data sources. Several jurisdictions no longer report to the ICSS and have transitioned to CCSS reporting.

   The intent of the CCSS is to fully replace the ICSS, as well as most components of the other correctional surveys which collect aggregate data only and don't allow data disaggregation or record linkage (i.e., the Adult Correctional Services Survey, the Youth Custody and Community Services Survey and the Corrections Key Indicator Report). As such, administration of the CCSS streamlines data collection and production, reduces respondent burden, improves quality of the data, and increases timeliness of data dissemination.

   The CCSS is the only source of information collected according to standard national requirements that allows disaggregated data^{Footnote 13} analysis by categories such as sex, Indigenous identity, and racialized group for the correctional populations in Canada.

Mitigation factors

The overall risk of harm to the survey respondents has been deemed manageable with existing Statistics Canada safeguards that are described in Statistics Canada's Generic Privacy Impact Assessment, with particular emphasis on the following measures:

• The CCSS uses a separate data processing system for personal identifiers which maintains strict separation between personal identifiers and other data elements collected by the survey. This system has implemented enhanced security measures:
  • (a two-tier system of permissions) for the personal identifier files
  • the data are stored and processed separately
  • the data are accessible to only three employees responsible for processing the data and creating analytical files,
  • the data are never disclosed.
• Statistics Canada applies strict confidentiality practices and rigorous data quality processes during all production and dissemination activities.
• Experts at Statistics Canada have been consulted to ensure that the collection of data for the CCSS will be done ethically. The risks for residual disclosure are as low as possible, as access to personal information data is limited to a small number of persons (at any given point in time fewer than 10 persons can view these data).
• Analytical data files will contain only anonymized identification numbers and will not include any information that would directly identify an individual.
• For record linkage purposes, at no point during or after the record linkage process are personal identifiers brought together with analytical data in one dataset.
• CCSS products are vetted by subject matter analysts and methodologists to ensure the identity of persons under correctional supervision is never disclosed directly or indirectly.

Conclusion

This assessment concludes that, with the existing Statistics Canada safeguards, any remaining risks are such that Statistics Canada is prepared to accept and manage the risk.