Information & Ethics Committee on Feb. 28th, 2011

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I will now call the meeting to order.

Welcome, everyone. Bienvenue à tous.

This meeting is a continuation of the committee's ongoing study on open government. We're very pleased to have before us today a number of witnesses.

First of all, appearing as an individual, we have Madame Diane Mercier, who works with information services with the City of Montreal.

As well we have Monsieur Daniel Caron, librarian and archivist, from Library and Archives Canada. He is accompanied by Jean-Stéphen Piché, the acting assistant deputy minister, acquisitions sector.

From Public Works and Government Services Canada we have Mr. Mark Perlman, acting assistant deputy minister for the consulting, information and shared services branch. He is accompanied by Madame Christine Leduc, director of publishing and depository services with the consulting, information and shared services branch.

On behalf of all members of the committee, I want to welcome everyone.

We will start with you, Madame Mercier.

I should notify everyone that we have some other business to transact, so this part of the meeting will go to five o'clock.

That said, please go ahead, Madame Mercier.

[Diane Mercier, Doctor, Information Sciences, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Diane Mercier and I am a practitioner, researcher and consultant in knowledge transfer. For over 20 years, I have been working as an information professional for the City of Montreal. I am currently in charge of open data. I have multidisciplinary training, which goes to the heart of your concerns. I have a Master's in computer science and a PhD in information sciences. I am involved in many training and research activities at a number of Quebec universities and public organizations. My testimony, as an individual, will focus on the benefits of open data from the perspective of knowledge transfer.

Public data are part of the common good that we need to be able to use and that allows us to transfer a considerable amount of knowledge. Public organizations are the keepers of this knowledge. When these data become open, they contribute to the transparency and accountability of our public organizations and to the promotion of ethical behaviour.

In Quebec, data are documents, digital or otherwise. They include information and knowledge management systems, which are the embodiment of expertise. In Quebec and in our major cities, it is the young people who are challenging public organizations. Just like the rest of the world, they are calling loudly and clearly for free access to data in order to use it, to add value to it, to better understand the world and get involved in making it a better place according to their own values. They want to be able to use what belongs to them, since public data, we must remember, essentially belongs to the public, not to public organizations.

For example, it was these young people who contributed to the public consultation that was organized jointly by the Commission permanente du conseil municipal sur les services aux citoyens and the Conseil jeunesse de Montréal. The commission recommended that the City of Montreal explore the possibility of circulating open data. These same young people also participated in the five-year review of the Charte montréalaise des droits et responsabilités.

Yes, intergenerational transfer of knowledge does take place, but it needs to be extended promptly to all citizens and communities, and especially within public organizations. Knowledge transfer through open public data is also very beneficial for enhancing the quality of management in our public organizations. It helps to break down organizational silos and to promote understanding, solidarity and consistency among staff members, making them aware of what is happening in their organization. In addition, this all has an economic impact on efficiency. The internal transfer of public information also helps to ensure the protection and sustainability of public intellectual capital.

Where are we now and where are we heading?

Making public data completely open does not happen overnight. The proof lies in the first annual review of the cities and governments that wanted to demonstrate this concept. Achieving open data fully will take time. We will need everyone's continued efforts, we will need the efforts of politicians, governments and citizens in order to bring the intellectual capital up to date. The LiberTIC group has clarified the process for completing the initial implementation phase: advocating, showing the relevance, bringing players together, and convincing leaders. In Quebec, some organizations are already there and should soon be able to move on to the next phase, which is planning initiatives. First, elected officials have to examine the issue. Then they will vote on legislation and adopt policies.

Leaders have to approve directives, standards and action plans.

The public will have access to catalogues of sets of open data based on conditions tailored to their use.

Public organizations are creating interfaces for direct access to public databases, and the public will be able to contribute.

Finally, accessibility standards will be applied to webcasting first, and then to the whole document production chain.

But that's not the end of it. After doing the planning, adjustments will constantly need to be made. The risks of going backwards will be significant. Privileges, exclusive agreements and information behaviours, such as procrastination and information overload, could put a lot of pressure on reverting to closed data.

In addition, the online community is likely to want to take centre stage in open data and define the challenges as being essentially technological. However, open data is only in part related to computing. It is important not to fall into this trap.

Above all, open data is a human and political issue, and that is what our approach should be if we want it to work. It is up to the highest authority in the organization to provide leadership and to assign this task to the data-production units within the organization. Open data cannot be achieved elsewhere, such as by computer services, public relations or consultants.

The following are some suggestions to facilitate and support the adjustment phase and the task given to the highest authority in the organization: first, get appropriate support by hiring information professionals, integrating them with the teams in the data-production units and placing them in strategic roles; second, provide managers with support in the classification of public documents; third, develop and hone the information and social skills of managers and employees in all areas.

Other considerations are: adding value to data through metadata; digitizing downloadable documents and multimedia items into an accessible format; and getting rid of proprietary technologies and software applications, since accessibility is not compatible with closed-source software. Finally, employees and the public should be both encouraged to be involved in the development of applications.

As a result, the organization will acquire the social skills and learn to adjust and refocus its strengths, by using the data, the metadata, understanding how they operate and how to use them.

Those are some of my observations, and I hope you will find them useful.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you, Mrs. Mercier.

We are now going to Mr. Caron.

[Daniel J. Caron, Librarian and Archivist, Library and Archives Canada]

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. I am here in my capacity as Librarian and Archivist of Canada, to share with you my observations and comments about your study on open government. I am accompanied this afternoon by Mr. Jean-Stéphen Piché, the Assistant Deputy Minister responsible for our acquisition sector.

Library and Archives Canada combines the holdings, services and staff of the former National Library of Canada and the former National Archives of Canada. Our mandate, as defined in the Library and Archives of Canada Act is to preserve the documentary heritage of Canada, to be a source of enduring knowledge accessible to all, to facilitate co-operation among communities, and to serve as the continuing memory of the Government of Canada and its institutions.

The digital age instilled profound shifts in how societies access their documentary heritage, and open government is just one factor among many in this transformation. In particular, the increasing use of information technology by governments and citizens makes it possible to distribute information immediately and at a lower cost. This use of technology allows us to better understand how governments work. It increases the expectations of Canadians, both with respect to government accountability through increasing transparency, and with respect to civic participation in socio-economic debates.

I should point out that this important paradigm shift has not led to a change in the order of business for Library and Archives Canada, nor to a change in our institution's reason for being. We are continuing to collect our country's documentary heritage in its varied forms and we are trying to make it as accessible as possible within our legal, regulatory, and administrative environment.

For Library and Archives Canada, as for all member institutions, society's greater access to its documentary heritage raises multi-dimensional issues in view of the volume of collections, the diversity of the origin and nature of records, and the different vehicles by which we acquire them. These three different factors have ethical and legal repercussions on our ability to make documentary heritage accessible to Canadians.

The issue of the volume of collections will be resolved gradually through the digitization of holdings. The diversity of the origin and nature of records and the way in which they are acquired raise questions about the system of access governing the various components of our documentary heritage. For example, the records of the Queen's Privy Council have their own system of access; books that are published in this country, which are kept under the legal deposit program, have another system; records subject to solicitor-client privilege have a different system; records from ministers' offices have yet another one, and so on. Finally, when Canadians decide to entrust documents of high value to Library and Archives Canada, it is important that they feel they can do so with confidence, knowing that the access given to them is in accordance with their wishes.

The few rules I have just mentioned are part of society's access management framework in which Library and Archives Canada operates. This framework is composed of several statutes, such as the Access to Information Act, the Privacy Act, the Copyright Act, the provisions in the Quebec civil code that relate to property, and the equivalent common law principles. In addition to these statutes, there are internal government regulations and policies and a series of special rules that apply to Library and Archives Canada covering specific situations or contractual agreements between the institution and its donors.

At present, one of my priorities is to clarify the rules that make up the access management framework, to resolve any inconsistencies, fill any gaps, and make this management framework as widely available as possible. This will be our contribution to the evolution of the framework. I believe that the more clearly the framework's elements are articulated, the more effectively Library and Archives Canada will be able to play its role. In turn, this will contribute to a healthy, sustainable and trusted environment between the various creators of information—government institutions, donors, artists, and so on—and all Canadians who wish to have access to their documentary heritage.

The importance of the trusted environment I'm referring to must not be underestimated, because the access framework is the culmination and reflection under the rule of law of how citizens wish to use their documentary heritage. It is the connection between people and their collective memory.

All these efforts will allow us to increase our effectiveness in processing access requests. These efforts are parallel to the work of this committee on open government. Your proceedings and reports will inform the different components of the access management framework that govern the activities of Library and Archives Canada.

Mr. Chairman, I would now like to underscore a number of initiatives that Library and Archives Canada is currently engaged in, initiatives that increase support of the concept of government openness, in my view.

First, in partnership with the Canadian Urban Libraries Council and the War Museum, Library and Archives Canada has started to digitize military records from the past world wars to support a pan-Canadian Lest We Forget program. In addition, about 4,000 items from the old map card catalogue, now in the public domain, have been digitized and may be consulted online. Furthermore, the records of the Canadian Expeditionary Force from the First World War have been digitized and loaded into a web portal.

Second, in collaboration with the Treasury Board Secretariat, Library and Archives Canada leads the first phase of the digital office initiative. The goal of this initiative is to create an environment where borne-digital documents will remain digital from creation to access.

Third, over the past five years Library and Archives Canada has led a record-keeping initiative that has culminated in a record-keeping directive that applies to 250 federal institutions and ensures that records of business and archival value are kept within the memory of the Government of Canada.

Fourth, over the next year, Library and Archives Canada will double the volume of its online content, adding millions of genealogy images to its website in partnership with Ancestry.ca.

Lastly, Library and Archives Canada will gradually offer its access to information service online by responding to requests with digitized documents. This initiative will yield two important advantages: it will accelerate our response time, and digitized documents will be infinitely reusable for repeat requests.

Mr. Chair, I would like to conclude my remarks by summarizing the presentation I made to the International Council of Archives last September. To better serve Canadian society, Library and Archives Canada must be selective in what it acquires, more robust in how it preserves the documentary heritage of Canadians to ensure the authenticity and integrity of information, and more porous to provide better access to its holdings.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, I would be happy to respond to any questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Merci, Monsieur Caron.

We will now go to Mr. Mark Perlman from Public Works and Government Services Canada.

Mr. Perlman, the floor is yours.

[Mark Perlman, Acting Assistant Deputy Minister, Consulting, Information and Shared Services Branch, Public Works and Government Services Canada]

Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, thank you for your invitation to address this committee concerning the administration of crown copyright within the federal government and our role in support of open government.

My name is Mark Perlman and I'm the acting assistant deputy minister of the consulting, information and shared services branch of Public Works and Government Services Canada. I'm accompanied today by Madame Christine Leduc, director of the publishing and depository services program, which includes crown copyright and licensing.

I'd like to begin by positioning the role and responsibilities of our organization within the broader context of copyright in the government.

Industry Canada and Canadian Heritage are the two departments that are jointly responsible for the Copyright Act. Section 12, chapter 42 of the Copyright Act is generally referred to as Crown copyright and is the only section that is relevant to works belonging to the government. Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat is responsible for the communications policy which includes requirement 28 on copyright and licensing. Government of Canada symbols such as the Government of Canada signature, the Canada word mark, and the arms of Canada are protected under the Trade Marks Act. Individuals or institutions external to the Government of Canada cannot use these marks without prior authorization of Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat.

The crown copyright and licensing unit, or CCL unit, within Public Works and Government Services Canada has been given the mandate under requirement 28 of the communications policy to administer and protect copyright in works produced by federal government departments and agencies. This policy applies to all federal government departments and agencies specified in schedules I, I.1, and II of the Financial Administration Act.

It is important to note that under this policy, departments and agencies are solely responsible and fully accountable for approving or denying requests for the reproduction, adaptation, or translation of information produced under their respective institutions. CCL does not have the authority to approve or deny any requests. Our role is to provide a centralized administrative service through which applications can be submitted via a single point of contact for approval to reproduce, adapt, and translate Government of Canada information.

CCL facilitates the administration of crown copyright by first receiving, reviewing, and evaluating the intended use of the information; second, verifying that the information belongs to the Government of Canada; third, determining the author, department, or agency responsible for the content to be used and forwarding the request for approval or denial to them; and, finally, responding to the requester once the decision has been reached. If an intended use is commercial, a requester will be required to enter into a licensing agreement for a specified period of time. Management of such licences is also carried out by CCL in coordination with author departments. Any rights granted are non-exclusive, which means that any other party can also apply for a licence to the same material.

I would like to emphasize that the administration of crown copyright is not meant to restrict access but to ensure that the Government of Canada information is not misused when it is modified, adapted, translated, or republished.

The Crown copyright office is administered by a small group of four people. It receives over 1,000 enquiries a year by email, telephone and mail from Canadians seeking general copyright information. Approximately 4,000 applications for copyright clearance are received and processed each year. Ninety-five percent of requests are granted. Permission is never denied except for valid, transparent and common-sense reasons.

Permission would be denied if the information was intended for inappropriate advertising purposes, such as photos of National Defence personnel being used to promote the sales of firearms, as an example. In addition, no permission will be granted that would lead to a suggestion of an official endorsement by the crown when none existed, such as the use of Health Canada information with an indication of cooperation with the department when in fact none existed.

Given the significant number of requests received annually, and recognizing the increasing demand for easier and better access to Government of Canada information, CCL undertook an initiative in 2009-2010 to streamline the procedures and processes required under the administration of Crown copyright.

As a result of the work that was conducted with the legal services of our department, Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat, Industry Canada, and Canadian Heritage, and following consultation with 57 government representatives, we're pleased to report that the requirement to request permission to reproduce Government of Canada information for personal or public non-commercial use was eliminated unless otherwise specified in the work itself.

An example of this would be publications that contain third party material or photographs that do not belong to the crown. These would be identified with the copyright logo and would mention that all rights are reserved.

This change is now reflected in the common look and feel standards for the Internet under the Important Notices page on all government websites. It has also begun to appear in print publications.

As a result of this initiative, the executive director of the Canadian Association of Research Libraries sent a letter of commendation to various ministers, including the president of the Treasury Board, praising the government.

Mr. Chair, I would now like to take a few minutes to highlight the unique role our organization plays in making published information available to the public.

As the Queen's Printer for the Government of Canada since 1886, we have a long history of making government information easily accessible to Canadians through published material. Through the depository services program, which was created by order in council in 1927, we acquire, catalogue, and distribute Government of Canada publications at no cost to a network of more than 700 academic, legislative, federal, provincial, and public libraries in Canada and abroad, including the Library of Parliament, Library and Archives Canada, and the Library of Congress. Senators, members of Parliament, and political parties are also members of this program and can order publications from it.

With the advent of the digital age, there was an important shift to electronic formats. As part of the government online initiative, we instituted the Government of Canada publications website and database. Publications.gc.ca is a one-stop shop for government publications. It provides access to more than 180,000 publication records, and more than 80,000 electronic publications can be accessed and downloaded at no cost.

The collection continues to grow, and more than 16,000 records are added annually on average. Last year there were more than 9.2 million downloads, and we expect there will be more than 10 million during the 2010-11 fiscal year. We also provide Canadians and the library community with valuable information about what is being published in the government through the weekly checklist of government publications, which we produce in both electronic and print formats.

Our long-standing relationship with the library community also helps to support open government. We respect and value the important role libraries play within their communities by helping Canadians acquire and understand government information.

Since 1981, we have chaired the Library Advisory Committee, which is made up of senior representatives from the major library associations in Canada, as well as representatives from the various types of libraries that we serve and key government departments such as Library and Archives Canada, the Library of Parliament, Statistics Canada and Treasury Board Secretariat.

Mr. Chair, I would like to conclude by saying that our organization is constantly striving to improve public access to Government of Canada publications and information, and to maximize the use of the latest technologies to better serve Canadians.

Thank you for providing us with the opportunity to talk about our programs.

I look forward to your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you very much, Mr. Perlman.

That concludes the opening remarks, and we are now going to the first round of members' questions.

We're going to start with the Liberals. Dr. Bennett, you have seven minutes.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Thanks very much.

I'd like to follow up on crown copyright, Mr. Perlman. To actually go to full open government, open data, would there have to be changes made to the way that crown copyright is administered now in Canada?

[Mark Perlman]

As I said in my opening comments, we do administer the policy of the Government of Canada. In the way it's administered currently, federal departments have the freedom to make public any of the information they choose, and the rights remain with those departments.

In answer to your question, I believe that the information is available. On February 9 Environment Canada and, I believe, NRCan were here, and they talked about their portals. Departments are free to make the information at their disposal available to the public. That is available under the current system.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

So people put crown copyright as a hurdle in moving to open government, but it doesn't sound as if it's a hurdle. Maybe Mr. Piché was also nodding there. The government could put all of the data sets up right now and not have to worry about crown copyright.

[Christine Leduc, Director, Publishing and Depository Services, Consulting, Information and Shared Services Branch, Public Works and Government Services Canada]

On the crown copyright administration, the rights are made available to Canadians to reuse unless otherwise stated, but a lot of the government information right now contains third party information, or information that's not necessarily negotiated to make public, so there are still constraints. Data sets and databases are probably the ones that contain a lot of information that cannot be made readily available to the public at the present time.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

The other hurdle that the committee has been struggling with is the issue of official languages. Does anyone have advice on what would be in keeping with the Official Languages Act? Is it to make things public in the original language, or is there a view that everything needs to be translated?

[Christine Leduc]

I'm not a specialist in the official languages, but I know the Government of Canada has a policy that all information we publish and make available publicly must be in both official languages.

A lot of the data sets and information contained in databases is not translated. It's unilingual for the most part. It also contains a lot of characters and information currently not available in both official languages, so having information in both official languages is an ongoing issue for government.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Obviously open government is about the public. At Library and Archives Canada or in Montreal, how do you determine what the public would view as high-value data? You can't do everything at once. How do you suggest that the government move forward? Do you think an e-consultation with the citizens of Canada would be a good way to hear what they would want first?

[Daniel J. Caron]

With regard to how Library and Archives Canada determines what is of interest, we first answer the requests of our users. On our latest initiative, instead of photocopying the requests, we are digitizing them; over time, they will become available to all Canadians. We believe that repeated requests will be better served that way. Then we'll increase the amount of information that will be available over time.

On another important point, now that all the information is being created digitally we're trying to work on the various fronts--publishers and departments--so that by 2017, the time between when we acquire the documents and when they are made available to all Canadians will be close to zero, according to the access framework that exists. We're obviously going to respect the legal framework, but our objective is to ingest digitally so that it becomes available as it is being sent to us.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Madame Mercier, public consultation is part and parcel of developing an open government piece. Do you have any experience in what has worked in other jurisdictions?

[Diane Mercier]

The City of Montreal has made progress with public consultation. As I said earlier, there are various standing committees on public consultation. The last two I have heard talked about open data.

But I would like to come back to the language problem. Quebec municipalities are probably not as affected by the language problem because Quebec’s public language is French. The municipalities write their documents in French. Of course, we also distribute some documents in both languages, and even in other languages. That is why translating data to make it open to the public does not apply to us. It's different in Quebec.

We need to really understand that, when it comes to open data, a distinction has to be made between an interface for distributing data and the data themselves. Numbers and even interviews can still be shown and made public even if they are not translated. There are also tools for automatic translation if there is an urgent need for access. It is a matter of quality, and quality is never perfect.

I was telling you earlier about information overload. That is something that public administrations are coming up against. They are afraid to act and find a variety of excuses not to go forward.

It is important to give the public accurate and timely information. If it takes five months to translate a document, it is no longer timely.

That’s what I had to say.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you, Dr. Bennett.

Madame Freeman, you have seven minutes.

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

First of all, thank you to each and every one of you for your very interesting presentations. My first question is for Mr. Perlman and Mr. Caron.

Just recently, Corinne Charette, the chief information officer of the Treasury Board Secretariat, told us that she was about to launch a single portal that would coordinate all the data from the various departments and organizations. The Treasury Board Secretariat is actually responsible for releasing information.

Have you been consulted and are you working together with Ms. Charette? If so, what steps have you taken with the chief information officer of the Treasury Board Secretariat? How do you work together?

Mr. Caron, go ahead.

[Daniel J. Caron]

We are working closely with the chief information officer, Ms. Charette. We have worked together with the Treasury Board Secretariat to develop the record-keeping directive. This will bring more rigour into an electronic world that is quite out of control.

To come back to your question specifically, we do work with them. But the data that interest us are historical and archival data. The data you and Ms. Charette are referring to are data on the current operations of the various departments they are working with.

The Treasury Board Secretariat has our full support for that. But that is going to depend more on the departments and how they will create and manage their information. We have a supporting role because what we are interested in is actually part of that information. We want it to be created, preserved and transferred to us.

We are interested in historical data, so longer-term data.

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

Mr. Perlman, what is your opinion?

[Mark Perlman]

Madame Charette didn't work with us on this, because when it comes to crown copyright, that's not the issue. We work with the communications policy people at Treasury Board to establish the policy; then we administer the policy as set out.

In line with what Mr. Caron has just stated, she would be working more closely with the departments that are accountable for that information. As I mentioned earlier in my answer, if departments choose to put their information out, it has no impact on crown copyright licensing.

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

Mr. Perlman, as Acting Assistant Deputy Minister for Public Works and Government Services Canada, are you aware of the developments between your department and the Treasury Board Secretariat in terms of open data and more specific information, such as contracts?

[Mark Perlman]

Public works is a large department with many ADMs who are responsible for various elements. Yes, I do hear about various elements at the management table, and I know that Corinne Charette works very closely with Maurice Chénier and with John Rath-Wilson, the assistant deputy ministers responsible for our information technology area. There's also our corporate group, which will be working with her on various elements dealing with our department, but on the government-wide basis of work, they are the policy centre for the government. They liaise directly with the various parts of various departments. On the government-wide basis, that's not the role that we play with them.

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

If I understand correctly, in both cases, you are not really aware of the single portal that Ms. Charette from the Treasury Board Secretariat would like to set up, since you are dealing with copyright, documentation and archives.