Information & Ethics Committee on May 29th, 2013

[A voice]

His name is Stephen Taylor, not Stephen Harper.

[Stephen Taylor]

I don't think we have all the facts regarding what occurred. I look forward to getting those facts before giving an opinion on that issue.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

What would Stephen Harper say, as president of the National Citizens Coalition, about accountability? Who would be accountable for those actions?

[Stephen Taylor]

I can't speak for Stephen Harper, but I know the National Citizens Coalition regards the issues of accountability and transparency as very important.

If members of this committee want transparency and accountability, I think they will support this legislation. I don't think transparency and accountability can apply to the organizations or institutions that are politically expedient for any particular party. I think this with respect to the entire public service and the entire government. We should seek to apply accountability and transparency no matter how comfortable or uncomfortable it is or how advantageous or disadvantageous it is for any particular cause. The cause of transparency and accountability is for the Canadian people, not for any one party.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I can see that the members—

[The Chair, NDP, Pierre-Luc Dusseault]

One moment, Mr. Andrews. Mr. Mayes has a point of order.

[Colin Mayes, Conservative, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Mr. Chair, could we stay on the subject matter, which is Bill C-461? This is not in order, and I don't think it's fair to the witnesses that they should be answering these questions. They came here to discuss Bill C-461. Let's stay on that topic.

[The Chair, NDP, Pierre-Luc Dusseault]

Thank you for your comment. I was just going to remind you that we need to stay as close as possible to Bill C-461 and its spirit.

Mr. Andrews, could you make sure as much as possible that your question has to do with Bill C-461? We must not go off in all directions by talking about topics that are not related to the spirit of the bill before us.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I hope this doesn't come off my time.

The witness did bring up the inquiry that's ongoing right now. He did talk about waste in the public sector, he did talk about transparency, and he did talk about accountability of parliamentarians.

I can see how members opposite are getting very bothered by these types of questions, as you have pointed out.

I'll ask you another question. If Stephen Harper was president of the coalition, what would he say about a Senate whitewashing of a report?

[Stephen Taylor]

Sir, if I can—

[The Chair, NDP, Pierre-Luc Dusseault]

Mr. Warkentin has a point of order.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, you did give a very clear indication that there was a necessity to bring it to the legislation at hand. We have limited time with these witnesses and I think it's important we bring attention to the legislation we're reviewing.

I respect the fact that Mr. Andrews thinks he has a job to be entirely partisan at every opportunity possible. Unfortunately, the Canadian people deserve better.

[The Chair, NDP, Pierre-Luc Dusseault]

Thank you.

I would like to remind Mr. Andrews once again that his question has to stay on the topic of Bill C-461. Otherwise, I will have to give the floor to the next person on my list.

I am not telling you what questions to ask; I am simply asking you to limit them to the context of the bill. I am giving you one last chance, Mr. Andrews.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd say to Mr. Warkentin that I will take no advice from him on partisanship at this committee.

Mr. Taylor, if Stephen Harper was president of the National Citizens Coalition, how would he account for more accountability for this piece of legislation, or to any other piece of legislation, on being accountable to the people of Canada, when someone in his office would do something that wouldn't be accountable?

[Stephen Taylor]

I think if Stephen Harper were president of the National Citizens Coalition, he would appeal to all members present, with respect to the current legislation before this committee, to support the legislation if they do believe in accountability and transparency in all aspects of the public service.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Mr. Taylor, when Stephen Harper was president of the National Citizens Coalition, if a matter became before Parliament, wouldn't he be calling for more accountability and more openness and transparency, as is in Bill C-461?

[Stephen Taylor]

In fact, I sit before you today at this committee calling for more accountability and transparency in the public service and in government. In the spirit of that, I encourage you to support this legislation.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I have no further questions.

[The Chair, NDP, Pierre-Luc Dusseault]

Thank you.

I will now give the floor to Mr. Warkentin for seven minutes.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Moving back to the bill, I think it's clearly important that we search through this bill.

Mr. Thomas, when my colleague Ms. Davidson was speaking to you in the last little bit, you had talked about the necessity of getting the balance right.

My constituents are taxpayers, and Canadian taxpayers subsidize CBC at a rate of $1 billion. I know somebody over there said that's not a lot of money. Where I come from, $1 billion is a lot of money. My constituents deserve to know.

As I reflected on access to information, crown corporations and agencies of the federal government have been extended the responsibility to allow access to information to the general population. There are a number of agencies and crown corporations that deal with sensitive information. I think of BDC, and I think of the individual bank loans that are being considered. That information has never been considered to be at risk because they are now subject to the Access to Information Act. You can also look at organizations like Farm Credit that also lend money—it's the same type of sensitive information. Nobody has charged that their information is somehow now in jeopardy because it's subject to the Access to Information Act. All kinds of other departments—the immigration department or the health department—deal with very personal information of folks. Nobody has said that they might somehow be subject to disclosing personal information.

CBC has now undertaken a blanket exclusion, and has probably taken it to the nth degree to protect all kinds of information. The Information Commissioner has made it clear that at no time have they reviewed a request for journalistic source material. My constituents are wondering what's going on. Why is this the case? But my constituents also believe fundamentally in the necessity of protecting journalists and the sources that go to journalists. They believe in a free media. They believe that a free media is essential for a free society, and therefore we have to get this balance right.

I don't know if you have any reflections with regard to getting the balance right. It's important to us.

Mr. Thomas, you had suggested that there may be a necessity for an amendment. We just heard from the Information Commissioner, who is reluctant to do anything different from this bill. But we heard from CBC and other media organizations that were pretty strong in their demand for changes. I don't know. Do either of you have a reflection on how the balance might be assured?

[Stephen Taylor]

Sure. I'll just say that it is very important to get that balance right. I do think that journalists' source protection and the relationship between sources and journalists are important for a free media in a free society. I do think the proposed amendment on the CBC, regarding exclusion specifically for journalists' source protection, is a good one.

I think that providing an injury-based exemption for all other material—this is all good in principle. My only concern about that has been that the CBC has used pretty much any loophole to abuse that sort of trust that legislators and lawmakers have provided it for protecting information.

I remember an example of an access to information request on how many cars the CBC has in its fleet. It was revealed that there was only one Ford 500 sedan in the entire fleet of the CBC after an access to information request was “fulfilled”—we'll just use that word loosely. Pages and pages came back, all blacked out. Indeed, after being pressed by I believe the Information Commissioner, months later it came out that there were over 700 vehicles in the fleet. This has nothing to do with journalists' source protection. This has everything to do with the daily administrative costs of the CBC, which is in the interest of the taxpayers who fund it for what Mr. Boulerice described as a very reasonable amount and what you have described as being not really a modest chunk of change for taxpayers.

I do think we need to strike the right balance. I do think that, yes, journalists' source protection is paramount, and that's why it's so critical that we get the balance right and do it here.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

I think both of you talked generally about the desire to see a sunshine list in terms of pay. This bill doesn't call for that. It calls for something different. It calls for an ability to access the information on the individual's pay through an access to information request.

Tell me how that differs from the sunshine list. You talked about the benefit in Ontario of a sunshine list. I've heard reflections on that sunshine list as being both positive and problematic. But this is different.

Could you describe the difference, and your reflections on the difference between the sunshine list versus what this bill calls for?

[Stephen Taylor]

Sure. This bill calls for case-by-case requests for information on public servants at DM-1 or above. The Ontario model puts all that information for every public servant earning $100,000 or more on a public website. This is a great tool. There are not many complaints. Taxpayers love this sort of thing.

The problem with the current Ontario list, if I can play advocate here, is that it's not available in a machine-readable format. For example, in the discussion of open data and access to information, and the ability to take data, to mash it up, to build programs that run through the data and be able to sort it, that's very difficult to do as the data stands on the public website, although it's disclosed.

Ideally, what we would like to see is a sunshine list for all public servants earning $100,000 and above disclosed on a website, but also available in a machine-readable format so that data analysts can process it easily.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

It seems to me this bill doesn't call for what you're asking for, but it may provide more usable information in terms of giving not only the pay but also the job description of the individual being disclosed. I think it's different from the Ontario list, but of course it doesn't allow for comparisons because it would be one person.... Well, maybe there could be multiple people being asked about for pay as well as for job descriptions.

[Stephen Taylor]

Yes. Part of the importance of this is to be able to compare the function of those in the public service versus the related jobs or related responsibilities and activities in the private sector, so that taxpayers can actually see if that level of compensation is competitive or non-competitive.