Thanks very much, Chair.
It's an interesting conversation today from the witnesses. I appreciate your feedback.
The Information Commissioner was asked how much of a drain vexatious, malicious or frivolous ATIPs were on her office and had this to say:
It has a huge impact. My office has only three people dealing with our own access requests. Last year, we received a request that ended up with 33,000 pages. We ourselves had to request an extension, because we are subject to the act as well. We don't want to say “no” to access requests, but sometimes we are realizing that it's difficult to negotiate or to try to understand what is behind the request.
I am sure that institutions, as I said, all have their one or two or three requesters who are difficult or who are asking for information where, at the end of the day, you wonder, “What are you going to do with those 22 million pages?”
I ask you, Mr. Beeby, as a person with an investigative journalism background—and I have ultimate regard for the role of journalists in being the watchdogs of how government operates and how we provide services to Canadians—how do you feel about this current influx of what I like to call “blogger journalism”, where an opinion becomes...or is maybe trying to change public opinion or is taking away from that public trust of the organization that is the government?
Do you think that has an impact on how ATIPs are being responded to right now?