Evidence of meeting #44 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was work.
A recording is available from Parliament.
February 14th, 2011 / 4:45 p.m.
Conservative
Harold Albrecht Conservative Kitchener—Conestoga, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to our witnesses for being here today. I think we've really been enjoying this study on open data and open government, and we certainly see many of the benefits, especially as they relate to some of the things you've just mentioned in terms of the economy.
I certainly want to applaud your statement about community groups and volunteer organizations. That's one message that I think we, as members of Parliament, have the privilege of sharing over and over again. We get to see the value that many of these community groups bring to our communities. As you point out, government couldn't do it and wouldn't be able to afford to, and often it's done better.
In your statement, I think I heard you say—and you many want to correct me on this—that with regard to these neighbourhoods you've identified at the city level--even down to the ward level, and possibly even below that--the Government of Canada has the responsibility to report at that very small level, if I can use that term. How would that actually improve efficiency, when cities would have better access to the data and possibly report more accurately at that smaller level?
4:45 p.m.
As an Individual
As to efficiencies, there is an issue about standards and common practices across all federal departments, agencies, and crown corporations: I would hope they would disseminate and aggregate data in that way, but in fact they don't. There's no standard practice.
CIC captures data according to landings. Well, landings could be anything, anywhere in Canada. Other agencies capture their data by postal code. Well, those postal codes don't line up with neighbourhoods, etc.
I would suggest that we roll up our sleeves and consider the geographies that Canadians once used to describe themselves, to talk about their communities, and to organize themselves. Then let's make a policy of aggregating these data according to those geographies. That would be efficient for the federal government, because you would have a standard that would span the country. Everybody collects point data, but everybody aggregates it differently, and they don't talk to each other.
The other efficiency is that you would have interoperability between the different institutions. I have great fondness for community groups, because they're the ones who keep our communities vibrant. They're the ones who keep us all accountable and make sure that we do the things we're supposed to do, in cities in particular. They need those data at that scale to focus their efforts. For example, a school board needs to understand its catchment area. On population health, there was a great Senate committee that looked at social determinants of health. We need local micro-geography so that we can actually look at where these health issues are occurring, so there would be an efficiency there as well.
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
Harold Albrecht Conservative Kitchener—Conestoga, ON
Mr. Chair, I point out that I don't disagree with the premise at all.
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
Harold Albrecht Conservative Kitchener—Conestoga, ON
I'm simply saying that we all recognize that ward boundaries change. Cities may add multiple wards from election to election, and I think it would be difficult for the federal government to take responsibility for reporting at that level. Certainly, I agree it should be reported there.
As to the other point you made regarding the Federation of Canadian Municipalities' quality of life reporting system, again that's great content and great philosophy. The thing I found surprising in your numbers there, if they're correct, was that in 1996 you had 16 communities participating, and now it's only up to 24.
It must be disappointing to you to find so slow a level of adoption of that system. That's just one every two years. Is there a reason for that? How could it be accelerated?
4:50 p.m.
As an Individual
It represents about 75% of the Canadian population, because it's 24 of Canada's largest cities.
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
4:50 p.m.
As an Individual
Yes. It's hard work to do this, to collect these 200 indicators across time. All the city officials donate their time and group-purchase the data to be able to do this work. It's really quite cumbersome, but it is continuing to grow.
On the geography question, the geoconnections program creates this file called the Canada street network file. It's a collaboration between provinces and territories. The data are created at the provincial and territorial level using interoperability standards, data standards, and the same types of geographies. It's a mosaic all together in one file, and it is shared back to Canadians.
All geography files could be created in that same way if we adopted those standards. All federal districts change every 10 years with the census. Health district boundaries change, but they don't change at a huge and fast rate, even in cities. We've done all of this amalgamation business and we can move forward and get our work done. There are good ways of being able to aggregate these data, ways that are not administratively heavy or difficult. The technology is there; we just need the will.
4:50 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
Good day to both of the witnesses. Thank you for your presentation.
Ms. Lauriault, I find it quite interesting, because this is the first time that a witness has spoken to us about community groups. You talked about how open data can help those less fortunate, such as senior and the homeless. The process ensures that more data, information and services are available free of charge to the poor.
My first question is about the feasibility of access of information. You said it would be interesting to have a portal. The Treasury Board Secretariat is responsible for implementing the Access to Information Act and for ensuring open data. You talked about a portal in each department.
Would you not prefer to see a single portal to which every user would be redirected? Your users, often low-income earners, are not very adept at doing searches. Enquiries are directed to people who are highly skilled at seeking out information. You also deal with community groups and with communities that are more vulnerable. Wouldn't a simplified single portal be a better option?
My second question is directed to you as well as to Mr. Mason. It has to do with information that should not be disclosed.
Ms. Lauriault, the approach that you describe in your submission is much clearer. However, I'd like Mr. Mason to be a little more specific. I got the impression from the eight points listed in his submission that even private information was not safe from disclosure.
I'll let you answer the question.
4:55 p.m.
As an Individual
Perhaps I should let Mr. Mason field that question, because I've been talking a lot and he hasn't had an opportunity to say much. Is that alright with you?
4:55 p.m.
Bloc
4:55 p.m.
Executive Director, Visible Government
I just wanted to say that having one portal is not absolutely necessary, because if the metadata from these content sources are published to a particular standard, it's very easy for centralized places to find that information.
With regard to privacy of information, there are absolutely clear lines, and there are grey areas where information should not be released. As Tracey has been pointing out, aggregated data are the safest kind of data to release, but even then, if you have a very small population centre and it could only be one or two people they're talking about, there's still a danger. However, this is the kind of problem that can be resolved, and we're moving forward on lots of large data sets that can be easily released.
It's going to be a big project and it's going to take a long time to release all the finest levels of data, but I think there's quite a lot of information that can be released today with....
4:55 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
I apologize for interrupting you, Mr. Mason. You state in your submission that you want unrestricted access to documents under open license. By that you are asking for access to data without copyright, patent, trademark, trade secret, confidentiality or security restrictions.
Could you explain your approach to us in further detail?
4:55 p.m.
Executive Director, Visible Government
The approach that I think is most appropriate for most publicly produced and publicly funded data sets is a well-known license called Creative Commons by attribution. What that means is that other people can take those data and reuse them for their own purposes, but they have to link back to the original producer of the data. In a culture, that means that people will see a data source. They may try to abuse the data, but those data have to link back to their origin, so if they're in network of people and they're trying to spread false or abused information--
4:55 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
In your opinion, should copyright be abolished or should it be maintained?
4:55 p.m.
Executive Director, Visible Government
What we're talking about is a new form of copyright that's designed for sharing. It's really designed for the Internet. It's designed for these kinds of data sets. It's called Creative Commons. There's a movement behind it to revitalize copyright to make it easier to understand and easier to share. It's easier to remix and have different kinds of uses that are past the very simple traditional view of copyright that mostly exists today.
4:55 p.m.
Bloc
Carole Freeman Bloc Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC
Okay.
I'm curious as to whether some of the agencies you represent operate in the Quebec City region.
I see you nodding. However, what is the situation when it comes to disseminating information in French, which is an official language?
4:55 p.m.
As an Individual
The City of Montreal is involved in the work and portals of the Community Data Consortium. This community disseminates Statistics Canada data in English and in French. We also communicate in both official languages.
In the case of the FCM Quality of Life Reporting System, the data as well as the reports are disseminated in both official languages.
Naturally, it is not always easy to ensure that databases are in English and in French, quite aside from how they are described.
It is critically important for the technology used for data sharing, for the research approach taken and for the database description provided to be bilingual. Aside from official databases such the Statistics Canada and Elections Canada ones, we are proposing and recommending that other databases be disseminated in the language in which they were created.
We have files X, Y, Z, 1, 2, 3 and 4 with as many headings as possible in English and in French. That is how we do things.
As to your question about portals, I will use as an example Ottawa's public libraries. Several of them have their own collection and their own portal. However, everything can be accessed through the City of Ottawa's Public Library portal. Users search at one location, but are linked to all of the branches.
We are calling on Treasury Board to set standards for portals like these with good metadata. Users would search at the same location, but the onus would be on the ones who create the data to manage it properly within their own institution, because they are most closely associated with that data.
As far as copyright is concerned, Mr. Mason is not suggesting that we do away with it altogether. He is arguing that some other licenses are more open in terms of digital data sharing. New Zealand, Australia and England have adopted these types of licenses.
Another license, called the Public Domain Dedication and Licence, just recently appeared on the Web. It is something I suggested in my report.
I also recommend that you get in touch with the University of Ottawa's CIPPIC. David Fewer, Michael Geist and Teresa Scassa are experts in copyright law, specifically in copyright as it pertains to data.
You'll find some references at the end of my submission. I list all of the organizations that I have mentioned here today. You can contact them for more information.
And feel free to get in touch with me, Mrs. Freeman.
5 p.m.
Liberal
5 p.m.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
Thank you for coming here.
Can you tell us a little about the international initiatives that prompted you to put forward some of the ideas that you have discussed with us here today?
5 p.m.
As an Individual
The British model inspired me a great deal. The history of open digital data can be traced back to England. The story actually goes back 400 years, to the astronomers and scientists who were the first to develop data hundreds of years ago. They had always worked together and shared their data, because they knew that the data on lakes and forests needed to be organized and shared.
In point of fact, England had the most regressive policy in place with respect to cost recovery, as well as the most regressive licensing system of all countries that, like us, had adopted the Westminster system. The Guardian newspaper launched a campaign calling for the public dissemination of data. In the area of public sector information management, there are open data and access to information policies such as the European Union open data policy and the Europe INSPIRE initiative.
England organized its institutions looking to broad European Union policies for inspiration and in the spirit of open government. Everything I've talked about today can be found in that country.
Another example to consider is that of the United States. However, their case is unique in that they already have in place a system whereby documents created in the United States are deemed to be in the public domain.
Here in this country, we have a bit of a problem because data is not subject to a public domain system, but rather to the Crown copyright system. We, the citizens, are subjects to the Crown.
We are not citizens in the same way as citizens in the U.S.
However, government responsibility for data dissemination is somewhat different.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
Is the whole question of Crown copyright that important? I'm asking the question, because I understand that a government publication cannot be copied in its entirety, contrary to what is done in the United States.
However, that publication can be used for just about any purpose. If, for instance, a journalist quotes a government document, he is not breaking any rules. If the media receives a report on public accounts, on Parliament's budget or some other subject, it can release that report to the newspapers, to television, or post it on their blog. Professors can discuss it. I understand the principle. However, from a practical standpoint , how important is Crown copyright?
5:05 p.m.
As an Individual
From a practical standpoint, Crown copyright restricts the rebroadcasting, reuse or resale of information produced by the federal government. If I want to use data produced by Statistics Canada, that department will advise me that I do not have the right to redisseminate that data, not only because of Crown copyright provisions, but also because their policy is...
