moved that Bill C-216, an act to amend the Access to Information Act (crown corporations), be read the second time and referred to a committee.
Mr. Speaker, my private member's bill has a very simple concept. Crown corporations are split; some crown corporations are subject to access to information and others are not. That is basically the crux of the bill.
The Access to Information Act was passed in 1983 and gives Canadians broad legal rights to get information from crown corporations and federal government institutions. The institutions then have 30 days to respond to those requests.
However, many crown corporations are exempt from the Access to Information Act. I will list a number of them. The Canadian Development Investment Corporation and Canada Lands Company are both exempt. Canada Lands Company is the federal arm that sells federal real estate. Why should it be exempt from access to information? This does not make any sense. It is selling Canadian assets.
Canada Post Corporation is also exempt. Why should it be exempt? I had a letter from André Ouellet, the head of Canada Post, objecting to my bill, saying that Canada Post is open and accessible in front of committees. I happened to be the Reform member on the public works committee in the last Parliament and we had members of Canada Post Corporation in front of us. They were anything but open. We were trying to get the subsidy on the 45 cent stamp whether it was going over to Purolator. We just wanted the straight facts on how much of the 45 cent stamp goes to Purolator. Canada Post simply refused to answer. However, the letter I received from the head stated it was very open.
I have introduced this bill because it would open up Canada Post to the Access to Information Act.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation is another one. Why should CBC not be subject to access to information? It should have its books opened up. The Canadian National Railway is also exempt. The Canadian Wheat Board is an interesting one because there is legislation before the House now that would take the wheat board out of the exemption status and put it into the area where Canadians can get information.
The Cape Breton Development Corporation, Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation, Halifax Port Corporation and Montreal Port Corporation are also exempt.
This is interesting. Why would Montreal and Halifax be exempt, and yet there are a number of other ports where there is access? This whole area is a dog's breakfast because some are open and some are not.
All my bill would do is make all crown corporations subject to access to information. There are a number of other members in this House who have different access to information private members' bills in, two on the government side and two on the opposition side that I am aware of.
This shows Canadians' interest in having the government accountable, government corporations, the federal departments open so that Canadians can access them, can find out what is going on inside.
This is not a closed club. This is just Canadians' money, Canadians wanting to know what is going on. My bill is votable. I am looking forward to the day when we can all stand up in this House and vote for it because I think it is a bill that has broad acceptance right across the floor, right around this House.
The reason this bill is put forward is to enhance public confidence in our government. Confidence in government institutions is dwindling.
In the last session of Parliament the auditor general published a scathing report on the operation of crown corporations on October 5, 1995. The auditor general is saying that crown corporations need to clean up their act.
Their problems were either in corporate and strategic planning or performance in measurement and reporting. Crown corporations need to be brought up. They need to be enhanced so they are accountable to the public.
I mentioned Canada Post. The government refused to put Canada Post forward for access to information in the last Parliament. Yet the Radwanski report, the report that did a detailed study of Canada Post, recommended that in fact Canada Post be open to access. The government failed to take that advice.
It is taxpayer money in these corporations that we are talking about. It is not some business or whatever. There would also have to be, in my mind, some cushions. For example, if there is a crown corporation that is in the open market, there would have to be some cushion that would allow that corporation to not divulge all its information if it is competing with a private enterprise because it has to be a level playing field.
It could not be allowed to open everything up so that the other corporation is private but then get into its market. There are some stumbling blocks. They are not stumbling blocks but little bumps on the road that need to be ironed out.
I would like to go over some of the corporations that I was talking about before. These corporations are already open. The Bank of Canada is open to access. CMHC and Canada Ports are open.
As I was saying earlier, Canada Ports is free for access, yet the Halifax port is not. It is just all over the place so that if we go through the list it makes absolutely no sense why one corporation, a port particularly, is not available and yet another one is.