Ending Access-To-Information Law Exemptions
Preamble
WHEREAS the offices of Members of Parliament, Senators, cabinet ministers, and the Prime Minister’s Office are exempted from the mandatory disclosure of government emails in response to access-to-information requests outside of formal police investigation;
WHEREAS access-to-information requests to the Privy Council Office on the Nigel Wright and Mike Duffy scandal received no email disclosures of either of the exchanges between the two public office-holders from the Prime\ Minister’s Office, yet the RCMP Information to Obtain production order turned up documents of public interest only with the discretionary consent of Corporal Greg Horton;
WHEREAS documents from these exempted offices will be deserving of public disclosure in many instances beyond suspected violations of the law judged by the judiciary or police to be of public interest;
WHEREAS the Centre for Law and Democracy and Access Info Europe have ranked 95 countries worldwide according to the efficacy of their access-to-information laws, finding Canada to rank only 56th best in their 2013 report;
WHEREAS Canada’s Information Commissioner Suzanne Legault, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression, the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic, and the Canadian Taxpayers Federation all support ending exemptions from the access-to-information regime for the various elected and legislative offices;
Operative
BE IT RESOLVED that the Green Party of Canada will support ending the access-to-information act’s blanket exemptions for the offices of Members of Parliament, Senators, cabinet ministers, and the Prime Minister’s Office, instead exempting select documents based upon category of content rather than the organization that produced said documents.
Background
The disclosure of email exchanges of the infamous “good to go” in the scandal of the Prime Minister’s Office was not necessarily an inevitable outcome of our democratic processes, and so highlights the tenuous accountability of the offices of elected officials and legislators. As CBC journalist Greg Weston put it in September 2013, “about all that's holding the Senate and Harper administration accountable are Mounties armed with warrants.” If release of a record trail like with the PMO scandal represents an exception and not the norm for broader secret office scandals detrimental to the public interest, then the existing exemptions regime hides the very depth of secret corruption within government. Even where criminal investigations reach into public offices the discretion of the police to unveil the public interest will be fallible. See these stories from before and after the Information to Obtain of the following November:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/senate-expense-scandal-left-no-paper-tra...
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/11/22/rcmp-investigator-moved-t_n_4325...
Access-to-information laws currently allow public access to the records of countless bureaucrats from the lowest levels to the office of deputy ministers, while various provincial access regimes apply to their respective legislators. Previous information commissioners John Reid and Robert Marleau have also warned of a growing crisis in access to government documents, but their recommendations were not pursued by the Harper cabinet. Various recent scandals around MP and Senators’ expense claims also demonstrate a greater need for office accountability.
The promise of transparency inherent in this motion is anticipated to be a clear political advantage relative to the opaqueness of supporting the status-quo.
Code
Proposal Type
Submitter Name
Party Commentary
This policy proposal is consistent with existing Green Party policies on Democracy and Government Accountability as well as Justice and Security.
Preamble
WHEREAS the offices of Members of Parliament, Senators, cabinet ministers, and the Prime Minister’s Office are exempted from the mandatory disclosure of government emails in response to access-to-information requests outside of formal police investigation;
WHEREAS access-to-information requests to the Privy Council Office on the Nigel Wright and Mike Duffy scandal received no email disclosures of either of the exchanges between the two public office-holders from the Prime\ Minister’s Office, yet the RCMP Information to Obtain production order turned up documents of public interest only with the discretionary consent of Corporal Greg Horton;
WHEREAS documents from these exempted offices will be deserving of public disclosure in many instances beyond suspected violations of the law judged by the judiciary or police to be of public interest;
WHEREAS the Centre for Law and Democracy and Access Info Europe have ranked 95 countries worldwide according to the efficacy of their access-to-information laws, finding Canada to rank only 56th best in their 2013 report;
WHEREAS Canada’s Information Commissioner Suzanne Legault, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression, the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic, and the Canadian Taxpayers Federation all support ending exemptions from the access-to-information regime for the various elected and legislative offices;
Operative
BE IT RESOLVED that the Green Party of Canada will support ending the access-to-information act’s blanket exemptions for the offices of Members of Parliament, Senators, cabinet ministers, and the Prime Minister’s Office, instead exempting select documents based upon category of content rather than the organization that produced said documents.
Sponsors
Background
The disclosure of email exchanges of the infamous “good to go” in the scandal of the Prime Minister’s Office was not necessarily an inevitable outcome of our democratic processes, and so highlights the tenuous accountability of the offices of elected officials and legislators. As CBC journalist Greg Weston put it in September 2013, “about all that's holding the Senate and Harper administration accountable are Mounties armed with warrants.” If release of a record trail like with the PMO scandal represents an exception and not the norm for broader secret office scandals detrimental to the public interest, then the existing exemptions regime hides the very depth of secret corruption within government. Even where criminal investigations reach into public offices the discretion of the police to unveil the public interest will be fallible. See these stories from before and after the Information to Obtain of the following November:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/senate-expense-scandal-left-no-paper-tra...
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/11/22/rcmp-investigator-moved-t_n_4325...
Access-to-information laws currently allow public access to the records of countless bureaucrats from the lowest levels to the office of deputy ministers, while various provincial access regimes apply to their respective legislators. Previous information commissioners John Reid and Robert Marleau have also warned of a growing crisis in access to government documents, but their recommendations were not pursued by the Harper cabinet. Various recent scandals around MP and Senators’ expense claims also demonstrate a greater need for office accountability.
The promise of transparency inherent in this motion is anticipated to be a clear political advantage relative to the opaqueness of supporting the status-quo.
Party Commentary
This policy proposal is consistent with existing Green Party policies on Democracy and Government Accountability as well as Justice and Security.