Mr. Liam Herrick:

There is a number of different aspects to that. First, in the category of high-risk use of artificial intelligence, it is contemplated that a fundamental rights impact assessment should be carried out. I again come back to the fact that all public bodies are already under a statutory obligation to ensure that all of their operations properly take into consideration human rights and equality. They are required under law to demonstrate that they do that in the planning stages, which should encompass and include procurement, and to review the operation afterwards. We have an oversight function to see whether public bodies are doing that. There has been a significant uptick in the number of public bodies that are in compliance with their obligations in this regard but it is still far from complete. We believe that the public sector duty can play a significant role in ensuring this. It is a question of adding an artificial intelligence dimension to the public sector duty obligations bodies already have. In that regard, it is unfortunate that there was not a cross-reference to the public sector duty when guidelines were being issued. Whereas we understand from some of the committee's previous sessions that the guidelines are not mandatory for public bodies but are to act as guidance, the public sector duty is a statutory obligation on public bodies. There is potential for that to be the vehicle to ensure that the impacts the Senator has identified do not manifest themselves.