Information & Ethics Committee on June 5th, 2007

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Okay.

So on her experience in making decisions delegated to her in the end, this would not necessarily be something new to her, based on her years of experience as an ATIP coordinator. Is that correct?

[Donald Lemieux]

That is correct.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

There was also a discussion at our committee on whether these new people are trained. Where do they come from, and so on? I just want to be clear that this document, which I think was asked for at the meeting by the chair, is sort of a training manual that every access to information officer would have.

[Donald Lemieux]

It's policy and guidelines. Basically it's an annual.... It's a how-to for the ATIP community.

In addition to that, there is general training that is provided globally. There's a three-day course that's given, I believe, at the Canada school, and there's also specific training on specific issues presented throughout the year.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

My next question is a combination question.

My understanding of how the process works.... The Treasury Board helps with the training and the policy side of things, in conjunction with Justice, and the additional work that Justice does is legal advice to ATIP coordinators and people in that field.

Is that an accurate statement of the type of work you do? You're not an appeal body of any sort. Is that correct?

[Denis Kratchanov]

That's correct. We're not there to make the decision for them or to review their decision. When we give legal advice, we'll give them a risk assessment of the application of certain exemptions. The ultimate decision to apply to the site, to apply an exemption, is made by the client, by the institution, not by the lawyer.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

I appreciate the work you have provided us. I think this is an excellent overview of how the system actually works. My view of what we should have been doing at this committee.... If you have an appeal, if you're not satisfied, as Monsieur Vincent was indicating in his questioning, you go to the Information Commissioner for that response. That is the mechanism we have set up for a complaint. Is that not correct?

[Denis Kratchanov]

Yes. There's nothing that prevents a requester from having further discussion with the institution directly, if he wishes, but certainly if he's not happy with the answer, he should be going to the commissioner.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

My view was that this committee should not deal with the item, because we know there is an appeal--I don't know if you'd call it an appeal, but a request for further information to the commissioner, or a complaint, let me put it that way, to the commissioner. Once that commissioner, who is a third independent body and reports directly to Parliament, reports, if we have permission from the complainant to release the information, we can discuss that, as a committee? Is that an accurate statement? Or the government...?

[Denis Kratchanov]

I don't think it's for me to tell the committee what it should or should not be doing.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

No. I'm talking about the process. From a process point of view, is that accurate? The commissioner will deal with the complaint and then will report to Parliament on that complaint?

[Denis Kratchanov]

He will report to the complainant and to the institution, that's certain. Whether he reports to Parliament, it's up to him to decide what he will put in his annual report. He certainly does not report on every single investigation.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

For us to deal with it...we would need the complainant to give us permission to deal with whatever decision he or she had heard directly from the Information Commissioner, or the department could release that information. I want to know what the law is on that.

[Denis Kratchanov]

The department can certainly release information that it has received from the commissioner, but in doing so, it must certainly not disclose the identity of a requester who has not been otherwise made public.

A department will, of course, be careful as well in not disclosing information in the commissioner's report to it that may itself contain confidential information, because in the commissioner's investigation you will have access to more confidential information, information that perhaps the government would not want to release if it was requested. And that will be taken into account by the government department in deciding what to release.

[The Chair, Liberal, Tom Wappel]

Thank you.

Mr. Dewar.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, again, to our guests.

I'm not sure who I address this question to. Maybe I'll pose it and decide. I think it might be for my friend at Justice.

At DFAIT, or for that matter at any other department, what are the provisions, if you will, for quality control, essentially, to ensure that Canadians get the information they're entitled to by law?

We have the Information Commissioner, but in terms of the department—I guess I'm going back to this business of a report card here—is there an independent audit at the year's end? Is there a review by some other decision-maker? Sometimes, in order to shed some light on problems or concerns, you might need that--getting a second opinion, if you will, which we all do when we're not sure of something or we want better service.

Is there an independent year-end audit ? Is there a review by some other decision-maker, and then getting a second opinion, where there are difficulties or controversial documents? We've heard references sometimes to other agencies.

I don't know if that's my friend at Treasury Board or Justice.

[Donald Lemieux]

Mr. Chair, as far as an additional decision-maker is concerned, I think the decision-maker is initially the institution, subject to a complaint to the Information Commissioner, as was mentioned, and further to the Federal Court if it's not resolved at that stage, and of course it can go up in the court system.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

That's an appeal as opposed to an audit. I'm talking about--

[Donald Lemieux]

Correct.

When it comes to audits, what Mr. Alexander referenced was that we do not have an audit function. The thinking is that there is the regime that Parliament set up with the Information Commissioner to review specific complaints.

We do, however, have statistics, and we have a new responsibility under the Federal Accountability Act with respect to the Access to Information Act, where we will be keeping additional statistics that will assist us in looking at trends.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Maybe I'll just leave this. This might be just a comment from me, and if you see it as a question, then so be it.

What I'm seeing here is that we have the policy oversight obviously taking in information and perhaps making some suggestions on guidelines. We have Justice keeping an eye on things. In terms of an actual independent audit function, that's what this is, but there seems to be a gap, and that is, what happens after this?

We talked a little bit about you talking to people who are in the ATI community, and keeping an eye on the court, obviously, and you need to follow up on those things. But in terms of an audit within the department to make sure their performance is brought up to service levels, I'm going to say that I think there's a gap. And I'm also going to suggest that....

I remember when I was on the Bill C-2 committee with my colleague, Mr. Martin. We said at the beginning, and then we were promised by the government, that we'd have ATI reform.

Maybe I'll put my question to my friend from Justice. Do we have, from the minister, a document on ATI reform?

[Denis Kratchanov]

I can't speak to that.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

But as far as you know--not you.

[Denis Kratchanov]

The previous Minister of Justice produced to this committee, I believe in April of last year, a document. There has been no other document that's been prepared that I'm aware of.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Okay. Thank you for that.

There was a discussion paper before on an open government act, in fact. I guess we would hope that we'd see this, and maybe that's to my friends on the government side. I recall clearly during the debates on Bill C-2 that we were promised...and as we said from our end, access to information is the oxygen for open government and transparency.

So when we look at how that's done...I'll give you another last point, Chair. How materials are gathered concerns me greatly because.... I'll give you an example.

I know Ms. Sabourin, as Mr. Wallace pointed out, was a very experienced person. She was giving advice and feedback directly on some of the cases that were in front of us. She was doing that on her BlackBerry, and she was very involved in the files. I think she was probably working very hard. I know that many public servants have a lot on their plates these days. I hear it on a regular basis. But you have a level of experience of someone like Ms. Sabourin, who is handling this directly.

I'm just wondering, is that typical practice, and is it common to have someone who is at that high a level dealing with a file of this nature directly? Maybe I'd ask you.

[Denis Kratchanov]

From my reading of the transcript, I thought she said the file had been assigned to one of her officers who had prepared the work that she had reviewed afterwards. But that's my reading of the transcript. So she was not alone working on that file.