Information & Ethics Committee on Feb. 12th, 2026

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Sturgeon River, AB]

By the way, with respect to the meeting, if it was such a productive meeting, why is it that according to the commissioner, when I asked her if things had gotten better since that meeting four months ago, things have not gotten better?

[Matthew Shea]

Again, I'm not going to speak to someone else's opinion of the PCO. I can tell you—

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Sturgeon River, AB]

My time is limited. I'll let you finish, but tied into that, the commissioner wrote to the clerk way back in July, and it wasn't until November that the meeting took place. It doesn't sound like the PCO was in much of a rush to meet with the commissioner, notwithstanding the fact that she's been sounding the alarm about the deterioration with respect to access to information, with the PCO being the worst offender.

[Matthew Shea]

May I respond, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Yes. I'm going to give you some time to respond.

[Matthew Shea]

I'll try to respond to most of that. Forgive me if I miss any of it.

In terms of the timing of the meeting, I can't speak to exactly how long the offices took to coordinate. The clerk was initially named in July, as I recall, and had a number of requests. I would imagine that the offices worked together to schedule that time.

Mr. Neilson is sitting next to me. His team meets regularly with the Information Commissioner's office to go through files and complaints to try to advance them. We work very hard to maintain strong relationships, not only with the Information Commissioner's office, but with Library and Archives Canada and the Treasury Board Secretariat, and we have made every effort to try to respond.

The actions we are currently taking are tied directly to the conversations we have had with the Information Commissioner, and I believe they should reduce the number of complaints.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Shea.

[Matthew Shea]

We are hopeful, and we are serious about this.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

We'll go to Mr. Saini for five minutes.

[Gurbux Saini, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Thank you for coming.

You mentioned that you cannot name or identify people. They are looking for the most secret information under the Privacy Act. Why shouldn't they be able to recognize...? Shouldn't there be legislation, if people are looking for very sensitive information, to identify who they are?

[David Neilson, Executive Director, Access to Information and Privacy, Privy Council Office]

The legislation actually protects the individuals so that we can process the requests without knowing who they are and so that we treat every request fairly and without regard to the identity of the individual. There's no bias involved because of certain individuals looking for top secret information or their own personal information. It's meant to protect the requesters.

[Gurbux Saini, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Thank you.

[Matthew Shea]

I would just add that there is a mandatory review of the legislation that happens every five years, and parliamentarians get to vote on any changes to the legislation. If any member feels there are things that should be added or taken away, that is the opportunity for members.

We have no opinion. We want to work within the policies and the laws that exist, and whatever Parliament asks of us, we will do our best to do.

[Gurbux Saini, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

What proportion of these requests is related to historical records, and to what extent do historical files contribute to processing delays?

[David Neilson]

Historical records account for about 45% of all of our complaints. I believe they're about 15% of all of our current access requests.

[Gurbux Saini, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

What specific challenges arise when requests involve complex files or extensive interdepartmental consultations?

[David Neilson]

It depends on what the record is. If it's a cabinet confidence, legal services get involved. We have to complete a consultation to get their recommendation with respect to whether information is a cabinet confidence or not.

When it comes to historical intelligence files, the PCO is an aggregator of information. We get information from our partners and from other countries, so we have to consult partners, such as GAC, the CSE, CSIS, or the Department of National Defence, to get input from their subject matter experts to be able to respond properly and to identify any harms that may or may not exist in the information that we're processing.

[Gurbux Saini, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

If the foreign countries that you're dealing with don't provide you the information, you can't then pass that information to the people who are requesting it. Is that one of the things that caused the delays?

[David Neilson]

Some of the delays are not because they're not giving us the information. Sometimes, when we consult Global Affairs, Global Affairs will consult the other countries, and sometimes they don't get a timely response. That causes some delays.

[Gurbux Saini, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Is there any mechanism available to PCO to force the other nations or agencies to give us that information?

[David Neilson]

There's no mechanism to force them. However, we do escalate things and we have discussions on an ongoing basis to try to facilitate a quicker response from institutions.

[Gurbux Saini, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

How does the PCO ensure that the record of co-operative values is preserved while maintaining system efficiencies?

[Matthew Shea]

We have information management policies that govern everything we do. We have systems of record that make clear that when you make a decision, you have to document it. Earlier, we heard about encrypted communications. It is required that even if you're using encrypted communications, if you make a decision, it must be documented somewhere else in the system.

I would take the opportunity to mention that it is totally appropriate to use encrypted systems. We use them at PCO because of the national security implications of some of what we do. It's not just Signal; it's BlackBerry Messenger and it's some of our higher-side technology. The classification of the system doesn't change the fact that we have obligations under the Access to Information Act.

We have clear policies in place. We do training with employees. We do training with ministers' offices to make sure people understand what needs to be kept—which types of information—and how long it needs to be kept.

If I'm being completely transparent, if we struggle in one place, it's that we're actually less good at deleting things than we are at keeping them, so we have lots of old financial or HR invoices that, quite frankly, we need to shred, because they're over the age where we need to keep them. That is where we struggle far more than not keeping something that we should. I think the real challenge is the fact that we actually overkeep information in government.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Mr. Thériault, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Shea, in 2023‑24, the Privy Council Office missed the deadlines set out in the act for responding to an access request 278 times. Some applications have been pending for two years or more, while the act requires a response within 30 days, need I remind you, unless an institution grants a longer deadline owing to the complexity of the request. So your institution is not at the top of the list. You are lagging behind when it comes to compliance with the act and its requirements.

In three quick points, how can you justify that? There may be four or five reasons, but what are the top three?

Second, I would like to hear what you have to say about the fact that, according to some experts, the act should be amended to require public institutions to respond to access requests as soon as possible—which would be an extension of the initial 30-day limit—and to require the Information Commissioner's approval to exceed 30 days, up to a maximum of an additional 60 days.

Are you able to comply with that?