Information & Ethics Committee on Dec. 5th, 2022

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

I appreciate that. Thank you.

What is the longest outstanding ATIP request?

I ask that question of each of the agencies at the table, please, for your department.

[Derek Melchin]

I don't have the exact timeline. Public Safety recently completed a parliamentary question where we were asked about this. We have at least two requests of around five years.

[David Neilson]

For the PCO, I believe it's about six years.

[Colleen Calvert]

It's around five for GAC.

[David Janzen]

Our backlog dates from around 2017 as well.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

How much time do I have left, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

You have about a minute.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

My question for everyone is, why? That predates COVID and the staffing challenges that each of your respective departments is facing. We've gone through a few different economic cycles since 2017. I do want to know why.

I guess I would ask, what is the consequence for not returning the ATIP in time? What's the consequence for having an outstanding ATIP in excess of five years?

[Derek Melchin]

With Public Safety, the ATIP requests that I spoke of were recently asked about in a parliamentary question. That information is publicly available.

The two requests predate the Information Commissioner's order-making powers, so there is not the possibility of the Information Commissioner's ordering Public Safety.... It's obviously publicly known, and we're working to address those requests as quickly as we're able to.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Barrett.

Next we'll go to Ms. Hepfner for six minutes.

[Lisa Hepfner, Liberal, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you also to the witnesses for being with us today.

I'd like to start with Mr. Janzen from the RCMP.

You all talked about this a little bit. We know that right now departments are trying to put information out in the public before people have to make an access to information request. We also know that a record number of people are looking for information. We've just come out of a period of turmoil with the pandemic.

Starting with you, what are the operational difficulties you're facing right now?

[David Janzen]

Forgive me; do you mean operational difficulties in terms of proactive disclosure, or operational difficulties just for the ATIP branch at large?

[Lisa Hepfner, Liberal, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

It's for ATIP. I think proactive disclosure is an extra step that everyone's trying to accomplish.

With all of those new factors, what are the operational difficulties that you're facing?

[David Janzen]

The RCMP is a relatively unique organization in the sense that one of our challenges is that when we have big events like we've seen in the last couple of years, like major floods, evacuations, the Emergencies Act, the deployment of RCMP personnel, that takes members' attention away from processing requests and files.

One of our other challenges is the fact that we are an organization with 30,000 members across the country. Unlike some of my colleagues who have more centralized areas to go to grab those reports or files from personnel when there is an ATIP request, we have to leverage our network across the country to go to grab those files, which adds a little bit of complexity.

I would say that our most significant challenge, though, is that our information management systems are not centralized. There's often a public perception from police procedurals or whatever that an RCMP officer or a police officer can access any information about anyone from a centralized position, and nothing is further from the truth. It creates a lot of challenges for us. Just last week, for instance, I had nine bankers' boxes full of papers to go through that were sent to me by a force airplane. That not only requires personnel from an investigative unit to go through with an ATIP analyst, but adds additional pressures on us, and all those records have to be digitized, etc.

I can go on at length. We have a fair number of challenges. Our software remains out of date. We're currently trying to upgrade that. The number of staff in our shop.... We're actively recruiting. We're doing a lot to bring in new talent to the organization, with new perspectives, new ways of analyzing files. But our vacancy rate remains high. We can't continue poaching from our partner agencies, because everyone is modernizing in the Government of Canada right now. We are doing some innovative stuff to try to hire from a national perspective. We have employees in Vancouver and Toronto now, just to try to expand the base from which we draw those employees so that we're not just stealing from each other, and we're still bringing the level of expertise we require to process the requests on time.

[Lisa Hepfner, Liberal, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Thank you.

That paints a really good picture of where you're at right now.

I'm wondering if I could just go to Global Affairs, to Ms. Calvert, and ask the same question about the specific operational challenges you're facing at the moment.

[Colleen Calvert]

Thank you for the question.

I would say that our challenge with staffing is definitely a big one for the ATIP shop itself in terms of keeping the numbers of staff high enough and the experience needed to get people to the level to provide the advice function.

Similar to what the RCMP mentioned, the people who are often the most pressed to act on emergencies are the ones who are getting the most ATIP requests on something that's very much in the public eye. It's very challenging to meet those operational requirements at the same time as dealing with ATIPs. That's definitely a big challenge.

In this time of clearing the backlog, one of the biggest challenges is clearing the backlog while staying on time with our current responses. We're very mindful of not wanting to fall behind on new requests, but we're trying to clear the backlog, and that balance is, really, a challenging one to achieve.

Then, finally, I'll just mention the technology. We are on the cusp of next fiscal year moving to a new processing system that we really need. However, our technology is not very capable compared with the information age we're in and the amount of information we have just going through emails every day and so forth. We need help reviewing that information. If it's just humans reviewing it, it's not quite fast enough.

[Lisa Hepfner, Liberal, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Thank you very much.

I'll turn to Ms. Soper from the Department of Public Safety.

Do you want to sum up your current operational challenges?

[Derek Melchin]

Since it's a question on ATIP, I'll speak about that.

The challenges we face at Public Safety are similar to those discussed by my colleagues. Within the ATIP community there's a shortage of trained personnel. Like David mentioned, we're all stealing from each other, and we've all recognized the need to move to something more constructive. Treasury Board Secretariat has actively been putting in place initiatives to help with centralized staffing to increase the size of the ATIP community, so we're actively participating in that work and supporting it. In the meantime, working to recruit and train up analysts from the ground floor is something that we're actively working on, and that does take an investment of time. While managers and supervisors in the ATIP office are doing that recruitment and training work, they're not necessarily working on files, so we have to divide our time and our energies.

That's one of the biggest things for us as a small department. The other issues that were mentioned by my colleagues, like technology and information management within the department, are certainly things that all ATIP offices face. I think that for Public Safety, as a small department, the resourcing is the really key one for us, so we're actively interested in being part of that effort.

[Lisa Hepfner, Liberal, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

I don't think I have time for Mr. Shea, but maybe one of my colleagues can get there.

Thanks.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Ms. Hepfner.

Mr. Villemure, you have the floor for six minutes.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I suggest the committee resume debate on the motion I moved on November 30, 2022.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Are you proposing that in the form of a motion, Mr. Villemure?

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

I propose that we continue debating this motion, which was moved on November 30, 2022. We adjourned debate on that motion last week.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

All right.

Just one minute, I'm going to discuss this with the clerk.

Mr. Villemure, if you wish to resume debate on the motion, we will have to vote on it.

There's no debate, and it's not amendable, from what I understand, so if you want to resume debate, we will have to go to a vote to resume debate on the motion that was presented or proposed on November 30, 2022.

I understand that it is the motion proposing that the committee undertake a study of China's interference in the 2021 general election.

We were debating this last time, Mr. Barrett. I've been advised by the clerk that it's non-debatable and non-amendable.

Mr. Fergus.