Without having seen the details, I do not know whether I could say that the case reported in today's, or yesterday's, newspaper serves to underscore the necessity of updating the act. It is possible that it was appropriate to censor the sections in question and that it was not an over-zealous application of the act. It is also possible that the opposite is true. I cannot comment without being apprised of the details.
To return to your question on the Access to Information Act, I cannot confirm whether the government intends to undertake a substantive review of the act. I can however tell you that my first move as Commissioner was to meet with the justice minister and offer him our full support in reviewing the act and preparing the groundwork before tabling a draft with the committee. The Deputy Minister of Justice and I agreed to review both the bill that my predecessor tabled and the discussion paper the minister tabled last April in order to establish areas of agreement: we set up a task force, which began work last week. We also want to evaluate whether Bill C-2 has resolved certain issues, as well as try to fill in some of the missing pieces, regarding matters that were addressed neither by my predecessor nor by the minister's discussion paper.
We hope to produce a discussion paper that will help both parties and will perhaps result in the committee being asked to study a draft bill. From our point of view, it is also a way of initiating a dialogue on administrative matters with the Department of Justice so that we have a better awareness of one another's situation when we have to take a public stance on issues.