They were supposed to issue their report early this year, but apparently it's been delayed until December.
Very specifically, there are things in the act that need to be changed. The 30-day timeline is fine, but the timeline doesn't take into consideration the consultation that happens between institutions. There must be limits on the number of consultations or the amount of time those consultations take, because right now the extensions that are being taken by institutions are often because of those consultations, which are not mandatory, by the way. The institution does not have to consult, but often they feel that they have to.
We need to have access to those cabinet confidences in my office, so that somebody—as I said earlier—who's independent from the government can review them and make our Canadians confident that the documents are under cabinet confidence.
The ordered power that I have is really helpful, but if an institution does not respond to the order—it hasn't happened yet—I don't have any mechanism to make sure that my order is being respected. I would like to have a certification process so I can go to the Federal Court and get the order certified. That would have another impact on the institutions, if they refuse to do anything about the orders or respond to the orders.
Also, all the exemptions and exclusions need to be reviewed with the goal of reducing their impact and making them more strict so that we are really limiting the reduction to the minimum.
We need to expand the act, too, to subcontractors and to third parties that are providing public services for the federal government. Right now they are not subject to the act. I think that Canadians would really appreciate that.