Information & Ethics committee  That's right.

Information & Ethics committee  The new act will apply to new complaints only.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes.

Information & Ethics committee  Right now, of the 60 investigator positions, only five are held by external consultants.

Information & Ethics committee  There's no cost to them.

Information & Ethics committee  Most of the people we deal with are satisfied with the office's services. Of course, no one is ever happy with the turnaround times. But, as you say, the office is here to uphold access to information and ensure compliance with the act. In many cases, we're able to resolve the complaint just by explaining to people what we have in front of us.

Information & Ethics committee  I'm not aware of any such cases. There are cases that end up in court after the documents are disclosed, of course, but I don't think that's based on my recommendations or my office's findings.

Information & Ethics committee  That's sort of the system we've put in place. Right now, we have a triage team that looks at requests as they come in and figures out if we can resolve them. I would say that it's much easier to resolve a case when the analyst from the institution has just finalized the file and the complainant knows exactly what they want.

Information & Ethics committee  Those are staff from corporate services, communications and legal services.

Information & Ethics committee  That would be ideal. But if Parliament passes all the provisions concerning the act that appear in the bill currently under study, we would need much more than that. The Senate has suggested amendments we weren't aware of. That could have a big practical impact on us.

Information & Ethics committee  It would hurt not only my office's credibility, but the government's credibility as well. Access to information has become a quasi-constitutional right, because we want Canadians to have access to information so they can question certain institutional decisions and ultimately have confidence in the government when it makes decisions that affect them.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes.

Information & Ethics committee  No, this will be based only on what is already set out in the act and will apply to new requests only. All the files currently being processed will be subject to the current act. I will be able to use the new provisions on new requests to help us better process the complaints.

Information & Ethics committee  People wanting to file a complaint with the commissioner can now do so online. The complaints form is available on our website.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, the number of complaints has increased, but in fact, not as a result of putting the form online. The number of complaints has increased since people started requesting a lot more information. The number of complaints about institutions has increased by 225% in six years. We now have 100,000 requests for access to information within the government.