I said that the system was on the verge of being irreparable. Of course, there are steps that can be taken.
COVID-19 demonstrated that our system was archaic. The access to information system still relies heavily on software that has not been updated for a long time and on bureaucratic processes. At the beginning of the pandemic, when people started working from home, they didn't have access to the systems that would allow them to respond to access to information requests. So they had to start really questioning how information was being managed, what systems it was stored in, how they could share it with each other, and then how it could be disclosed to Canadians.
We realized that there were a lot of institutions whose system was not up to standard. We are slowly seeing an improvement, but there are still institutions that tell us that employees have to work evenings, nights or weekends, otherwise the computer system is not fast enough for the quantity of documents to be processed.
In addition, many people told us that records managers—those who create records in programs—often refuse to come back to the office to get the records that would allow them to respond to an access to information request. Since people have been unable to get to the office or working from home, it has been very difficult to get access to documents.
We wonder why there are still so many files in paper format and why they are not being scanned. We also need to figure out how to transfer documents to Canadians without going through the post office.
There are all kinds of situations like these that persist and that the pandemic has made much worse.