Information & Ethics Committee on April 18th, 2024

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Are there thoughts about creating a plan?

[Caroline Maynard]

Doing that is not within my mandate.

Through investigations, complaints and dealings with institutions, sometimes we come up with best practices. During meetings with other institutions, I often refer them to these institutions that have good practices, but that is really within the purview of the President of Treasury Board Secretariat.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

That's fair.

You mentioned complaints, and you indicated that on certain files you have received a lot of them. How do you differentiate between frivolous complaints and what you would consider to be legitimate? Does doing that take up a lot of your time and resources?

[Caroline Maynard]

It doesn't, but I know it does impact institutions that have to deal with requests that are made in bad faith, that are vexatious or frivolous. Under the act now, they have the option of asking me to allow them to not respond to these requests. If I give them such authority, such approval, they can not respond to these, but they still have to prove that the requests are frivolous or vexatious, and that's not always easy to do.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

What does that process look like in your office?

[Caroline Maynard]

It's a very simple process whereby the institutions send us the wording of the request—because it's the request that has to be vexatious or made in bad faith—and then they have to give us the evidence or the arguments for why they believe it's a vexatious request. The requester has a chance to respond to the allegations and, based on those two submissions, we decide, based on the case law, whether or not the request itself is vexatious.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Are you able to share an example of such a vexatious request?

[Caroline Maynard]

We have a few summaries of those on our website. I can send them to you.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Can you share something with us today?

[Caroline Maynard]

We just approved one request that led to 2,000,000 pages. Without the co-operation of the requester to reduce it, it would have been such a huge imposition on the operation of the institution that we'd have agreed that the request was not reasonable.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Ms. Khalid.

Thank you, Ms. Maynard.

Mr. Fortin, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good morning, Ms. Maynard. Thank you for being with us.

[Caroline Maynard]

Good morning.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

This morning, I’m replacing my colleague René Villemure, who couldn’t be here. After a conversation with him, I have a few questions for you.

I understand your role. As the Information Commissioner, I imagine that you’ve had to work on redacting certain documents. I would like your opinion on that. For someone who is a bit of an outsider on this committee, it’s always surprising to see the quantity of words, of pages, when it’s not entire chapters, often redacted from government documents. I would like to hear what you have to say on this issue. In your opinion, is there currently too much redaction, or not enough? Should it be done differently?

What is your point of view on the redaction problem? It often deprives the general public and even parliamentarians of access to information that could be of significant interest.

[Caroline Maynard]

Generally speaking, I agree with you that many institutions react first by redacting documents instead of trying to give the most information possible through access to information. The Access to Information Act includes exceptions and they must be applied correctly. We often note that these exemptions are discretionary in nature. We note that institutions tend to use their discretionary power not to grant more information, but instead to block it quickly, rather than grant it.

Within the framework of our investigations, we try to work with institutions so that information is made accessible or not redacted any further. In certain cases, redaction is reasonable; in others, we realize that, if more information were granted, people would better understand decisions made. In contrast, hiding information often creates confusion and raises questions.

Certainly, the more information is made available, the more confidence there will be.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Can you explain where this rather widespread reflex among departments comes from? Why redact information more than necessary? What causes this? Is it distrust? How do you explain it?

[Caroline Maynard]

It’s very difficult to say. Every institution is different and applies different sections, but I think it’s often provoked by the fear of giving too much information, information that won’t be well understood. This culture currently exists within government, and we have to change it. This change really must come from the leadership. Ministers, deputy ministers and managers should encourage disclosure, not discourage it, but it’s a culture that is very hard to change.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

If I understand correctly, it’s rather widespread through different departments.

Can you tell us if a directive coming from higher up asked all departments to say as little as possible, or if it’s the degree of distrust that varies from one department to another?

[Caroline Maynard]

This culture has always existed. When the legislation passed, its goal was to grant access to information by limiting exceptions. However, I think the way people applied that legislation since then led to the opposite effect. We see exceptions being the norm instead of granting access to information. It’s generalized. It’s not done on an individual level.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Does this reflex have consequences on a financial level, for example, for the Office of the Information Commissioner? Does the fact that many documents are redacted lead to additional costs or not?

[Caroline Maynard]

It often has the effect of causing people who receive redacted documents to wonder what is being hidden from them. They have the right to file a complaint. That’s often what leads to more complaints for my office every year.

There are more requests, more information is refused, and so the applicants, the complainants, turn to us to get access to those documents.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

If I raise the subject of the report about the researchers at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg, do you know what it’s about?

I see you smiling; obviously, the answer is yes. If that’s not the case, tell me.

If I understand correctly, a total of around 600 pages in the report were redacted. If not in their entirety, then in very large part. After the parliamentarians who had access to the document finished reading it and commenting on it, the report was sent to the Supreme Court, where three justices reviewed it.

At the end of the day, of the original 600 redacted pages, I'm told that the equivalent of about 14 pages was left. How do you explain this?

[Caroline Maynard]

I can’t speak to that specific case.

That said, you’re flagging something that is problematic. Now that we know the result and the time it took to disclose the document, people are no longer convinced that documents are revised appropriately. That is why many complainants tell us they doubt the exceptions and exclusions are applied appropriately.

In fact, at the end of an investigation, they often receive more information than at the outset, which should not be the case.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

I see.

Thank you, Ms. Maynard.