Thank you. I jump at the opportunity to speak to this.
It's a deterrent fee. This is not really a cost recovery fee. It's a fee that's designed to make people think twice before using the FOI process. In B.C. we went from having no fee to really a mix now of $10 for some organizations and public bodies, and others that haven't implemented the fee just yet. As you say, there's been a really disastrous drop in the use of the act, especially by journalists who are looking to use it for accountability purposes.
My organization is filing more FOI requests now to monitor the effectiveness of the new regime under this situation.
Reducing the barriers to access information is fundamentally important in a democracy, and a fee is a barrier. We strongly support the removal of fees, and we certainly would oppose any increase in fees, including in the federal ATI system.
I'm heartened by the removal of processing fees as part of the federal reforms, but we really want to make sure that people are able to get accurate and timely access.