Canada’s Access-To-Information System Is Going Downhill

This article was last updated on May 19, 2022

Canada: Oye! Times readers Get FREE $30 to spend on Amazon, Walmart…
USA: Oye! Times readers Get FREE $30 to spend on Amazon, Walmart…Journalists must take the gloves off by pushing governments to be more transparent, challenging transparency claims and writing stories when they withhold information that should be released

Prime Minister Harper and Senator Duffy, will access to information requests get the story? (CBC photo)

By David McKie, Ideas Editor, j-Source

As we continue to watch the Senate controversy swirl and hijack Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s agenda, it’s easy to overlook the criticism that seems to be the root cause of the problems besetting the Conservatives.

Excessive secrecy is the common denominator in many of the scandals that have side-swiped the government: the Afghan detainees, the F-35s, the in-and-out controversy, robocalls and now the Senate.

Last month, there was another troubling report that also complained about secrecy: the information commissioner’s annual report.

Suzanne Legault, who does not possess the fire-breathing tendencies of some of her predecessors, has taken the gloves off, blasting the Harper government for an access-to-information system that is going downhill, and fast.

This is a state of affairs that must concern journalists at a time when governments of all stripes, and at all levels, boast about being open and take credit for making public an ever-increasing amount of data.

David McKie, CBC journalist (Twitter photo)

Journalists must also take the gloves off by pushing governments to be more transparent, challenging those transparency claims and writing stories when they withhold information that should be released, either formally through access to information or informally through simply asking.

For the rest of the story, see j-Source