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Information & Ethics committee  I'd like to begin by thanking the committee for inviting the Canadian Association of Journalists to comment on what we feel is one of the most fundamental challenges facing our democracy, namely, a lack of good information about what our public officials in public institutions ar

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  Yes. I mean, they are in the act, and there are 75 of them. Compared to the United States, that's voluminous. The United States has only about 14 loopholes that can be applied to requests for information. I think it would be fair to say that we have gone overboard when it comes t

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  While we agree with the report in its broad strokes, I would encourage the government and the members of this committee to think about access to information, to think about freedom of information in a more expansive way. The Information Commissioner has made recommendations that

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  I think that giving the commissioner order-making power would be a good idea. However, to use a sports analogy, it's great to give the referee more authority to clamp down on cheaters, but when the rules of the game are unfair, it is more important to change the rules of the game

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  I would question our overall spending on access to information. If we had fewer exemptions and exclusions in the act, then it would cost less to have government documents released to the public. That simply makes logical sense. As an example, in fiscal year 2014-15, in Canada, th

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  To be clear, I was actually referring to just simple requests for information from media and the public. We would phone up a communications officer, or we would have to go through a communications officer, in order to get information from the government. But to your point, yes, t

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  We would concur with the view that's been expressed by the CTF. Again if there were fewer exemptions and exclusions in the act, then less time would be required to release information to the requester. This is a major problem. I joined Mount Royal University four years ago, afte

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  I guess I would ask you why people who are not Canadians should have less of a right to information that may impact them. It's interesting that one of the reasons we ended up getting freedom of information legislation in this country was because Canadians were able to use the Uni

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  I listened to Professor Drapeau's testimony with interest and this particular recommendation that he made to the committee. For my own part, I would say we would disagree with the idea of turning access to information coordinators into political appointees. I understand Professor

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  Would it be possible, for example, that access to information coordinators be put under the jurisdiction of another independent body? For example, would the Auditor General be a possibility? I haven't given a lot of thought to what the solution might be, but I think the solution

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  What I'm trying to do with the single recommendation is to rationalize the system and provide greater openness. The commissioner has made various recommendations regarding the exemptions and exclusions within the act. I think the Canadian Association of Journalists' position wo

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  The Canadian Association of Journalists would also be opposed to the idea of a commissioner who wears both hats. When he was justice minister, John Turner delivered a speech entitled “Twin Freedoms”. He was referring to both the freedom to privacy and also the freedom of informat

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  I would concur, and I would even question whether or not it is necessary to have those deliberations protected. What are we really protecting here? Are we protecting cabinet ministers from embarrassment? Are we protecting a fiction that more than a dozen people in a room will alw

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  I appreciate the question and I appreciate the research that the member has conducted prior to this meeting. I would say that elected officials are in a role different from journalists'. Elected officials were elected by the public to serve the public. Journalists serve the publ

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman

Information & Ethics committee  I suppose it is the principle that is more important. Yes, no system is ever going to be perfect. Every system we create is a human system and human systems are not perfect, but you mentioned for example the idea of whether the public should know you are going to golf with someon

April 19th, 2016Committee meeting

Sean Holman