Evidence of meeting #72 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was request.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:20 p.m.
Liberal
4:20 p.m.
Co-Founder, Democracy Watch
I believe the government and political parties know more about individuals through using big data and mining into their lives than individuals know about the government. That's a perverse situation.
There is a balance, and it's imbalanced now. When I say actions and decisions, I'm talking about government actions and decisions.
4:20 p.m.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
Mr. McIntosh, you had a very good example about wait times in hospitals. There are wait times in hospitals because of a lack of resources for surgery or to see a physician. We could always have more doctors. We could always have more surgical suites. We could always have more that would reduce our wait times.
The reality is there is only so much money in the world and there is only so much time in the world, and there is only so much a surgeon can operate. We haven't been able to address that just because.... It's not that I doubt whether an NDP government or a Conservative government or a Liberal government in power wants to address it. I think everybody would like to address it. We again come to finding a balance.
Therefore, if we were to do what Mr. Conacher says, would be you happy that we moved resources from, say, hospitals or health transfers to get more into information access work?
4:20 p.m.
Director, Canadian Committee for World Press Freedom, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression
The point I made about hospitals, as far as I'm concerned, is something I know about, because some of my clients are medical organizations. Hospital wait times are not just about money. A lot of it is about just pure inefficiency, because there is not enough long-term care in this country and not enough home care. There are a lot of elderly patients in hospitals—about 15% of the beds—who no longer require acute treatment but who have no place to go. In the system, they're known as bed blockers, and that's what's messing up health care.
4:20 p.m.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
I was in the medical business for 30 years, so I'm well aware of those issues—
4:20 p.m.
Director, Canadian Committee for World Press Freedom, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression
Yes.
4:20 p.m.
Liberal
Frank Baylis Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
—but it would take resources to build those long-term care facilities. It's still a question fundamentally of resources, and there is a balance. I doubt that any provincial government doesn't want to do it. I think everybody wants to do it; we just always have to make the call on resources.
4:20 p.m.
Director, Canadian Committee for World Press Freedom, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression
Well, I would suggest that what has happened to the access to information system over the years has been simple neglect. Resources have been diverted over the years, chipping away at it. I have talked to people at the commissioner's office, and they have a backlog of complaints. I've talked to everybody.
4:25 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Zimmer
That's the time. We're well past the time, Mr. Baylis.
The last question, for five minutes, goes to MP Kent.
4:25 p.m.
Conservative
Peter Kent Conservative Thornhill, ON
Thank you, Chair, and thank you all.
When the President of the Treasury Board visited with us last week, he responded to the criticisms of the commissioner with regard to the regressiveness and to the recommendations of this committee a year ago and to pretty well all of the witnesses who've appeared before us by saying there will be a one-year review once Bill C-58 is passed.
Is one year a meaningful time? Is the government taking this seriously in terms of detecting what an awful lot of people believe is wrong—the shortcomings of Bill C-58? Can you measure those in a year?
4:25 p.m.
Co-Founder, Democracy Watch
I think you will be able to, but first of all, it's a review by the minister—
4:25 p.m.
Co-Founder, Democracy Watch
The minister will review whether he himself has done the job well over the past year. There's a conflict of interest in doing that. Then maybe there will be a second bill. I predict that if there is, it will be in June of 2019, and there will be no time to pass it before the election—“but if you vote for us again, we'll pass that bill for sure”. That's where I believe it's heading. This is what the past 15 years have been showing.
4:25 p.m.
Acting General Counsel, Fundamental Freedoms Program, Canadian Civil Liberties Association
We've reviewed the Access to Information Act. We've studied it. We've looked at it. I don't think we need another year to see how these changes go.
To address the point that was raised earlier about efficiency, I think some of the changes here introduce new inefficiencies into the act and will cause greater delays and require more resources.
4:25 p.m.
Director, Canadian Committee for World Press Freedom, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression
I would think a better course would be to get the bill right now and then have the five-year legislative review handle any changes.
4:25 p.m.
Conservative
Peter Kent Conservative Thornhill, ON
We were talking earlier about the capacity of departments to respond to questions. Within the ambit of “frivolous and vexatious”, I've heard interpretations that say those terms sometimes refer to the volume of questions from an individual requester.
Should government be looking at question quotas, or should government be investing in capacity to answer many more questions than when you and Mr. McIntosh posed your first question and had a 30-day response time?
Again this is a question for all three of you.
4:25 p.m.
Director, Canadian Committee for World Press Freedom, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression
Well, if the legislation says 30 days, then that should be the benchmark. If 30 days is not possible, then someone should make a case for 60 days or something. Personally, I think 30 days is reasonable.
4:25 p.m.
Director, Canadian Committee for World Press Freedom, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression
Quotas might get into the area of being a nuisance or vexatious. I don't know; I don't really think that's a problem.
4:25 p.m.
Co-Founder, Democracy Watch
The government—not this current government, for it started with the past government—has had no problem throwing literally hundreds of millions of dollars at an email system and hundreds of millions of dollars at fixing a payment system. When you're talking about allocation of resources, then, which was at issue in a previous question, put it towards making the information management system more efficient, use the Internet more for proactive disclosure of everything. Then you will not have a problem with requests, because you'll be able to say “Here's the link, here's the link, here's the link—it has already been disclosed, because we do it proactively all the time.”
That's the way to deal with this problem. Throwing up barriers of any kind is not the way to deal with it. It's punishing the public, who are the victims of the bad system that has been set up, and denying the public's right to know, which is a constitutional right.
4:25 p.m.
Acting General Counsel, Fundamental Freedoms Program, Canadian Civil Liberties Association
I agree. I think what we need is a proactive disclosure regime that's meaningful. This is a lot about travel and hospitality, which some people care about, but a lot of people care about what's happening in our closed institutions, such as our prisons, or what's happening at the border. These are things that people want to know. If information and records were disclosed proactively, you would have to worry about those frivolous and vexatious requesters much less. That would be my response.
4:30 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Zimmer
I'd like to thank all the witnesses for appearing today. We're going to briefly suspend to allow our current witnesses to exit and our new witnesses to take their seats.
Thank you again for appearing.
We'll briefly suspend.