Evidence of meeting #10 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cbc.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
That's a good question.
The identity of the requester is not to be disclosed, so these categories are somewhat imprecise because of the way people will couch themselves. These are statistics collected by the government writ large for all of the institutions. I think you'd have to ask the Treasury Board Secretariat how they define those categories. It is one of the areas where I think the information is quite imprecise.
Conservative
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
We categorize them in our office when the complaints come in, but they are imprecise. For instance, a journalist could make a request without disclosing that they're from the news media, so we would probably qualify that as an individual or a member of the public because we wouldn't know. Or you could have somebody who is an academic but doesn't report that, so we would count them as a member of the public. A company may make a request or a complaint via a law firm, for instance, and we would consider that a business.
It's very imprecise the way it's done. We do it on the basis of the information we have when we receive the complaint, and I think it's the same in the institution.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
So the requirement to be open and to disclose is not on the requester; they could be anybody.
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
Of course, yes.
October 25th, 2011 / 9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
They don't need to identify who they are requesting for.
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
No. That is part of the anonymity of the process, if you wish, or the confidentiality, so the institution that receives the request does not become subjective in the way it responds to the request.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
So you categorize on the basis of what the request is, then.
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
No. You could have somebody who self-identifies as a journalist, for instance, or media or an academic. But some people don't self-identify, and in fact some people use proxies because they don't want to be identified; they would be identified by the information that's there. If there is nothing other than a name and an address, it would be qualified as public.
Conservative
John Carmichael Conservative Don Valley West, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Commissioner Legault, I obviously have to be very quick.
We had Monsieur Péladeau here the other day as a witness, as you know, and he said that his companies have never made an access request or demand about journalistic activities. My understanding would be that that means journalistic sources and journalistic integrity are protected.
From the access review that you've completed to this point—those that have been done—can you confirm or refute those comments?
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
As I said, anywhere a claim has been made that journalistic sources are involved, I have not seen any of those documents, so—
Conservative
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
—none of these cases has been treated.
Conservative
John Carmichael Conservative Don Valley West, ON
My understanding is that the bulk of the requests are money requests: where is the money going? In other words, we have a public corporation or a crown corporation with public funding and the taxpayer dollars to fund it are going into a deep black hole. It has been suggested by previous witnesses that there are fiefdoms and empires within the organization over which senior management have no control.
My concern, and I would like to get your comments—
NDP
The Chair NDP Jean Crowder
Mr. Carmichael, your time is up. You can continue this in the next Conservative spot. So very briefly, and I'll allow Ms. Legault a brief response.
Conservative
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
I really can't comment on that. The bottom line, from my perspective, is that I have 196 cases that have not been looked at; they are on hold because they are claiming journalistic creative programming on those or part of those. And I have about 175 that deal with a whole bunch of exceptions and exemptions, and we're going to have to treat them.
NDP
Ruth Ellen Brosseau NDP Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Ms. Legault and Ms. McCarthy, for taking the time to meet with us once more. It's a pleasure to see you again.
I just want to ask you how much time you set aside for cases involving institutions before the court. Do they take up a lot of your time?
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
They actually take up very little time. Cases are brought before the court very infrequently. As I was saying earlier, at this time, our office has four cases before the court, including the CBC's case. We did have a case involving Canada Post. We now have an agreement with that corporation. There are a few more steps the court must deal with, but the case will be closed over the next few weeks. We have a case involving the Department of Justice and another involving the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
We have a few cases where we are taking action in terms of certain matters, but where other parties are also involved. We have a case in Newfoundland and Labrador against Hibernia and another one in British Columbia related to fisheries. There is also a lawsuit against us, a writ of mandamus.
So, we have seven cases before the court. Last year, we processed 2,100 cases, so that gives you an idea of the percentage of cases that make it to court. Those cases are very few.
NDP
Ruth Ellen Brosseau NDP Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
The CBC received an F grade, unlike some others. After receiving that grade, the CBC took other steps to improve its services. How does the CBC/Radio-Canada compare with other organizations?
Information Commissioner, Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada
Those people received the F grade two years ago, but things have improved since.
When we established the report cards, we looked at the performance of certain institutions that became subject to the act after the Federal Accountability Act was passed. Canada Post's performance was very poor. Its problems were different, but its performance was nevertheless very poor. The case of those two crown corporations was not very good compared with VIA Rail's case, among others. Ms. McCarthy and I actually met with VIA Rail representatives last week. The performance of that organization, which is also a crown corporation, was very good. Some specific provisions apply to VIA Rail. Its cooperation has been very good. It operates very well.
Atomic Energy of Canada Limited is also covered by an exclusion. However, it allowed us to check the documents. We have very few records on that agency, which is very efficient. Its access to information service works very well.
The two organizations that are still problematic are Canada Post and the CBC. However, they both appear to have made some progress.
NDP
Ruth Ellen Brosseau NDP Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
The CBC has brought a lawsuit against you. Regarding section 68.1, there is really a grey area when it comes to rules on journalism and programming.
Do you think that section 68.1 should be studied and amended?