Mr. Chair, one thing is very clear. When one looks at access to information overall, we really have about 20 or 30 departmental institutions that receive in excess of about 100 requests per year. Those are the departments where everyone should focus in terms of performance under the Access to Information Act.
Citizenship and Immigration Canada receives close to 50% of all access requests in Canada at the federal level year over year, and that means the performance of Citizenship and Immigration Canada is very important. That department, generally speaking, has been performing very well. After that you have other institutions, like the Canada Revenue Agency, which receives about 5% of overall requests but generates about 30% of the complaints to my office.
You have to look at each institution. If you ask me where the focus of the government should be and where the focus of this committee could be, it's really in these top institutions that generate the most requests, the most complaints, and follow their performance through their annual reports which they have to table in Parliament. They are supposed to incorporate my report card recommendations and their action plan regarding that into their annual report to Parliament. I've recommended that. The Treasury Board Secretariat has accepted this recommendation, and it will now be part of a mandatory reporting to Parliament.
Between my office, the government, Treasury Board Secretariat, and this committee, there should be better scrutiny on the performance of these institutions.