In their recently published book Your Right to Know, journalists Jim Bronskill and David McKie have done yeomans' work explaining how Canadians can use freedom of information requests to get government secrets. But, at the federal level, it's work they shouldn't have needed to do – pointing to another problem with Canada's broken access to information laws.

Introduced in 1980 by Pierre Trudeau's Liberals, the Access to Information Act gave Canadians a limited right to request government records. The bureaucracy's filing cabinets could now metaphorically be opened by anyone – unless the records in them included 75 different kinds of information that would still be considered secret.

But, even with those limits, the Trudeau administration seemed to have little interest in telling voters about their newfound rights or how to exercise them.

Just before the act came into force, the Globe and Mail told readers the government would be "placing posters in post offices and public libraries" to advertise the new program. But "it plans nothing else in the way of public information," a deficiency noted by information commissioner Inger Hansen in her first annual report.

At a news conference announcing the fees for access to information requests, then-Liberal cabinet minister Herb Gray seemed unconcerned about that lack of advertising, smiling when he told reporters, "That's why we invited you here."

Nor did the government give the information commissioner the power to aid journalists in the job of educating the public about their information rights, with Hansen writing her office had no mandate or funding to do so.

As a result, Hansen stated "the public appears unaware of the meaning of the act and the role of the information commissioner to mediate complaints and take proceedings to the Federal Court. Indeed, many who have tried to use the act soon gave up because they found procedures too complicated or too slow."

More than 30 years later, Hansen's successors still don't have that mandate, despite repeatedly requesting it. A spokesperson for the Treasury Board Secretariat, which administers the Access to Information Act, didn't provide a direct answer when asked why those requests hadn't been acted on.

Little promotion of your rights

By comparison, our country's privacy commissioner can "foster public understanding" about the collection, use and disclosure of personal information by organizations outside government.

Spending on that mandate totalled more than $3 million in the past fiscal year, with past expenditures resulting in the publication of a graphic novel and cartoons about privacy issues, as well as presentation packages for teachers and a youth video contest.

The government doesn't currently publish anything comparable about Canadians' access rights.

The Treasury Board Secretariat spokesperson stated in an email that individual departments do have instructions on their websites about how to file an access request, as well as a legal requirement to assist applicants.

But the manual that bureaucrats use to interpret and often restrict Canadians' right to know dwarfs those brief instructions. The secretariat's access advice, for example, weighs in at just 389 words. But 57 of the manual's 133 pages are devoted to what kinds of information must or can be kept secret.

Moreover, the government currently doesn't spend any money advertising Canadians' information rights, instead relying on news releases, speeches and tweets to do that job.

Americans are beating us

As a result, responsibility for popularizing that right continues to be principally shouldered by journalists such as Bronskill and McKie, as well as the handful of non-governmental groups concerned with freedom of information issues.

So it's near miraculous that, according to government statistics, 59,947 access requests were filed in the past fiscal year. But that still means just 169 requests were filed per 100,000 persons in Canada.

By comparison, during 2012/13, 222 requests were filed per 100,000 persons in the United States. That means Americans, who have considerably greater access to government records without using freedom of information requests, are using their right to know law 31 per cent more than we are.

And that's probably just the way Canada's paternalistic public officials want it. After all, for them, the fewer Canadians who understand how to file freedom of information requests, the better.

At their best, the responses to those requests tell us what's really happening behind the closed doors and drawn curtains of government. And, at their worst, they remind us just how little the government cares about our right to know — a secret parties of all stripes have been trying and failing to cover up for years. 

This article originally appeared on The Tyee.

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Partisans may not believe it, but Canada’s “culture of secrecy” existed long before Stephen Harper moved into the prime minister’s office. And it’ll be around long after he moves out, unless Canadians do more than just cast their ballots in the next election.

That’s why four groups concerned about freedom of information, one of which I’m part of, are launching a campaign encouraging Canadians to take a small but vital step on social media that would raise more awareness of just how much is being hidden from us: spotlighting examples of government secrecy with the hashtag #cdnfoi.

Such secrecy has its roots in our political system, which has a tradition of strict party discipline. Because of that discipline, decisions made by the government behind closed doors – in cabinet meetings, for example – are rarely defeated in the House of Commons, making secret forums the principle arbiters of public policy.

To be sure, the Harper administration has done more than its share to cultivate a backroom state, frustrating access to government records and officials, as well as failing to fix our broken freedom of information system. But Canadian society is an especially fertile ground for the growth of policies that violate our right to know.

In part, that’s because our country doesn’t have any groups that exclusively and routinely advocate for greater freedom of information at a national level. Probably the closest we have to that is the small BC Freedom of Information and Privacy Association.

But, as its name implies, the association’s two staff members toil on information and privacy issues in British Columbia and the rest of Canada from a tiny office above a beauty salon and spa in Vancouver.

Meanwhile, other organizations that care about our right to know have even more multiplicitous mandates. For example, Ottawa’s DemocracyWatch stands on guard for democratic reform and corporate responsibility, as well as freedom of information. Meanwhile, Halifax’s Centre for Law and Democracy also deals with other human rights issues abroad.

By comparison, the United States has three umbrella organizations that exclusively safeguard Americans’ right to know.

They include: OpenTheGovernment.org, representing 94 groups; the National Freedom of Information Coalition, representing 30 dues-paying groups; and the Sunshine in Government Initiative, representing nine groups.

Such umbrella organizations have always been few and far between in Canada.

In the seventies, a coalition called ACCESS: a Canadian Committee for the Right to Public Information was established to lobby for greater freedom of information.

Reports from the Globe and Mail back then described the committee as having the backing of groups such as the Canadian Manufacturers’ Association, the Canadian Labour Congress and the Canadian Daily Newspapers Association.

But long-time right to know researcher Ken Rubin stated in an email that ACCESS, which played a key role in the creation of Canada’s current freedom of information law, was actually “primarily a group of diverse individuals” that included academics, activists and lawyers and had some “paper” affiliations with other organizations.

Despite that key role, by the eighties the committee had folded. According to Rubin, during the same decade, a “loose coalition” came together under the auspices of the Canadian Federation of Civil Liberties and Human Rights Associations to “monitor and improve” freedom of information. That coalition also “went by the wayside” once the federation “faded away.”

Then, in January 2000, investigative reporter Robert Cribb announced the formation of Open Government Canada – a “national forum for FOI networking, education and advocacy pushing for legislative changes that grant greater access to public information.“

More than 25 groups were represented at its founding conference in March of that year. However, in an email, Cribb stated the coalition “died a regretful death.”

The reason: “It proved to be impossible to lure financial support for such an endeavour – part of the perplexing lack of concern, engagement or righteous indignation in Canada around issues such as freedom of information and the public's right to know.”

Those concerns aside, in 2011, DemocracyWatch launched the Open Government Coalition. So far, the coalition is made up of three groups – not counting DemocracyWatch and an affiliated charity. Although founder Duff Conacher stated in an email he plans to expand it this fall.

In the meantime, the New Democrats and the Liberals have proposed laws and policies that would open up government. They should be applauded for doing so. And, if the past is a predictor of the future, they may even act on some of those proposals if they win power – just as the Conservatives did.

But eventually the expediency of secrecy seems to seduce every government, regardless of its political stripe. Which means a New Democrat or Liberal administration will likely become just as tight with information as the Conservatives – albeit, perhaps, with more of a velvet glove covering that clenched, iron fist.

Don’t believe me? Well, look no further than the United States where Democrat president Barack Obama swept into office promising an “unprecedented level of openness in Government.”

Five years later, an Associated Press analysis found that in 2013 his administration “more often than ever censored government files or outright denied access to them last year under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act.”

More recently, the agency also listed “eight ways the Obama administration is blocking information.”

Meanwhile, for his part New York Times reporter James Risen has called Obama “the greatest enemy of press freedom in a generation.”

Just as neither the right nor the left has a monopoly on the truth, neither has a monopoly on secrecy.

As a result, it’s vital for Canadians to start paying better attention to our information rights so we can better safeguard them.

That’s why the BC Freedom of Information and Privacy Association, the Canadian Association of Journalists, DeSmog Canada and IntegrityBC, are now encouraging Canadians to tweet about threats to their right to know using the hashtag #cdnfoi.

Those threats include everything from backroom government meetings and frustrated freedom of information requests to inaccessible officials and nonexistent public records, whether they are at the federal, provincial or local level.

At present, the use of that hashtag isn’t widespread, making it more difficult for Canadians to know about such threats.

So, by just tagging stories about government secrecy with #cdnfoi, you can help your fellow citizens know about what they aren’t being allowed to know.

And you can encourage others to take up the fight by sharing these graphics promoting #cdnfoi – helping change Canada’s culture of secrecy in the process.

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The federal government has allocated more than $13 million for the Canada Revenue Agency’s (CRA) investigation of charitable organizations, which is planned to extend beyond 2017, according to documents obtained by DeSmog Canada through Access to Information legislation (PDF attached below).

Previous figures announced in the 2012 Bill C-38 Omnibus budget amounted to $8 million for the monitoring and investigation of Canada’s charitable organizations over two years.

According to the internal documents, the Minister of Finance approved $13.4 million in funding to institute new reporting requirements for charities engaged in political activities or receiving funding from foreign sources. The funds will also be used to ensure charitable organizations are “operating in compliance” with new rules. The document notes these new reporting and compliance initiatives will continue through the year 2016-17 and remain “ongoing.”

Screen shot of the Canada Revenue Agency document.

Screen shot of Budget 2012 plans as outlined on the Government of Canada’s budget website.

As the CBC recently reported, the CRA is auditing seven of Canada’s most prominent environmental charities, including the David Suzuki Foundation, Tides Canada, West Coast Environmental Law, the Pembina Foundation, Environmental Defence, Equiterre and the Ecology Action Centre.

Marcel Lauzière, president of Imagine Canada, told the CBC, “We’re concerned about what appears to be an increase in audits around political activity and in particular around environmental organizations.”

He added, “There’s a big chill out there with what charities can and cannot do.”

John Bennett of the Sierra Club said the rules the CRA is looking to enforce are unclear. “We don’t know what rules we’re playing by. The problem with this is that they gave the power to CRA to walk in and shut you down. And then if you want to complain, you can go to court afterwards.”

At least one environmental group, Environmental Defence, is currently appealing an audit report submitted by the CRA concerning the activities of the organization.

Ministerial correspondence documents, also released to DeSmog Canada, show the CRA and the Prime Minister’s Office received a significant amount of complaints regarding the investigation of charities, with letters likening the initiative to a “witch hunt,” “a wild goose chase,” a “crackdown…limiting free speech,” and an effort in “silencing those who can’t speak for themselves, and polariz[ing] the potential for public debate.”

Others claimed the monitoring of environmental charities would “negatively [affect] the dialogue required to determine the viability of resource development against environmental concerns,” and “was implemented to specifically target environmental groups opposed to the Gateway Pipeline development.”

To each complaint, the ministerial correspondence coordinator notes: “There is no expectation of reply from Minister Shea.”

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The oil and gas industry in Canada claims opposition to the oilsands, the world’s second largest reserve of oil and Canada’s fastest source of greenhouse gas emissions, is merely “ideological,” according to new internal documents released under Access to Information legislation (attached below).

In the documents the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP), Canada’s largest oil and gas lobby body, suggested that because “the objection to the oil sands is ideological” and “not a concern that Alberta’s current framework is not stringent enough,” there is no guarantee that a stricter regulatory regime for the development of the oilsands will “’secure’ social license and forestall negative policy action.”

Alberta, required to renew its oil and gas emissions regulations in 2014, is proposing a new greenhouse gas target that would see a reduction of 40 per cent per barrel of oil produced and a maximum penalty price of $40 per tonne of CO2 above that level by 2020. Currently Alberta enforces a reduction of emissions by 12 percent with a max price of $15 per tonne.

According to the newly released documents CAPP is fighting for a weakened regulatory position, one that requires a 20 per cent reduction with a $20 penalty fee.

As the Pembina Institute points out, CAPP's proposed regulatory fees would be merely tokenistic, only just keeping up with the price of inflation.

In the collection of documents released to Greenpeace’s Keith Stewart – containing correspondence records between the government of Alberta and CAPP from January to May of this year – CAPP says stricter regulations might cost industry a lot without winning over the public.

In a section of a document entitled “Framing the Right Questions” CAPP questioned Alberta’s proposed emissions targets:

“Will higher stringency requirements ‘secure’ social license and forestall negative policy action elsewhere? Unlikely. The objection to the oil sands is ideological; not a concern that Alberta’s current framework is not stringent enough. Put another way, if the 40/40 guidelines were enacted, oil sands opponents would claim that they too were insufficient.”

Beyond concerns with public perception, CAPP argued that a more advanced set of regulations on greenhouse gas emissions wouldn’t necessarily lead to a reduction in CO2 pollution. The lobby group also warned that stricter environmental regulations could restrict investment in oilsands research and development.

“Will higher stringency requirements deliver greater GHG reductions? Unlikely. The challenge with the oil sands is that current technology is not yet available for deployment to a significant degree.”

CAPP, however, threatened new regulations might be disadvantageous to industry operating in Canada.

“Will higher stringency requirements impact production and revenue? Very likely. Adding a regressive charge to the oil sands, one that bites harder at low prices than high prices, introduces additional cost and risk. This will impair recovery of marginal resource associated with existing projects. And make new projects less competitive from a portfolio perspective. And the higher costs associated with additional stringency can also impair the resources devoted to research.”

Yet a growing carbon pollution problem might in fact be the largest looming threat to the oil and gas industry, rather than tougher emissions standards.

Recently a group of 70 investors worth $3 trillion publicly pressured 45 of the biggest oil and gas companies to respond to the concern of ‘stranded assets’ – oil and gas reserves made un-exploitable due to international efforts to manage global climate change.

Investments in fossil fuel reserves have become increasingly insecure in the move toward a low-carbon economy.

Canada is heavily invested in the oil and gas sector, with a total market capitalization of $400 to $500 billion.

Despite CAPP’s positioning on the issue of “opposition to the oil sands,” it may be anemic oil and gas regulations that actually threaten the industry.

Without strengthened emission’s standards, oil and gas reserves will become an increasingly dangerous investment, compromising financial markets.

And the absence of a more ambitious regulatory regime guarantees that both Alberta and Canada will continue to fail to meet greenhouse gas emissions targets.

As the Pembina Institute reports, CAPP’s proposed standards “would see oilsands emissions grow from 55 million tonnes (Mt) today to between 95 and 98 Mt in 2020. The cost to companies would grow from 10 cents a barrel today to a maximum of 23 cents a barrel. Overall, the proposal would fail to even achieve Alberta’s 2020 target – a goal that’s far weaker than the 2020 target that Ottawa has adopted.”

Alberta accounts for 48 per cent of Canada's total greenhouse gas emissions. 

A new poll also shows a majority of Canadians feel climate leadership on the international stage should be a high priority for the nation.

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More than a year after the program's supposed implementation, negotiations over the Alberta-Canada Joint Oil Sands Monitoring (JOSM) program were still ongoing between the federal government and the Government of Alberta, email correspondence shows.

In documents obtained by the Globe and Mail through the Access to Information Act, it’s clear that the conditions of the program changed throughout the last year. Though details are unclear due to redactions in the released emails, it’s evident that the final deal wasn’t signed until June of this year after significant back and forth and meetings between the Alberta government—who publicly resisted the creation of joint provincial-federal program—and Environment Canada officials.

Bob Hamilton, Environment Canada’s deputy minister, wrote on March 28 of this year, more than a full year after the program was announced, that they “have a green light to move forward with OS [oilsands] monitoring.”

The program was designed to increase monitoring of air, water and habitat quality from annual to monthly, with results available to the public to allow for independent scientific investigation. Full reports were to be issued annually.

After independently appointed panels at both the provincial and federal levels deemed Alberta’s monitoring systems inadequate, the Government of Alberta still balked at the prospect of the federal government implementing a new monitoring system.

The newly released emails indicate continued pushback from Alberta and an unwillingness to face the full extent of the gaps in existing environmental monitoring policy.

One email shows that Alberta’s Deputy Minister of Environment Dana Woodworth believed the province’s existing system left it “well-positioned” to implement a new monitoring regime, in spite of widespread criticism of that system.

The final agreement also states than while the program is intended to undergo a full review in 2015, three years from the time it was announced, either party can cancel the program with six months’ notice.

Given the program's internal disorder, it is unsurprising the first results commissioned by the monitoring program have only just been publicly released.

A study conducted by Environment Canada shows rising levels of mercury in bird eggs tested downstream from the Alberta tar sands. Some samples taken from the eggs of predatory birds showed traces of mercury that exceed the threshold of what’s considered dangerous. The findings indicate mercury levels could be rising in the fish the birds consume. The report was published online last month by the Environmental Science and Technology Journal.

In spite of what the study’s lead author called a trend of rising levels of mercury, spokeswoman for the Alberta government Jessica Potter told First Nations residents of Fort Chipewyan and Fort McKay that the bird eggs were still safe to eat.

“It’s one study. It doesn’t necessarily indicate a trend. It’s just important that we continue to look into it,” she told the Globe and Mail.

And while the Alberta Government shared the results with those communities and the study was published academically, the results weren't made publicly available on the JOSM Portal website. An agreement signed in June states that all data produced through the program will be publicly accessible via the portal. Although the website lists ongoing testing, many of the results tables state that results will be released in coming months.

Screen shot taken from the JOSM water monitoring page.

Environment Canada researchers said they couldn’t pinpoint the tar sands or any single factor as the cause of mercury increase, though one test revealed that mercury levels had risen two thirds since 1977 and the early days of tar sands' development. Dr. Craig Hebert said coal plants in Asia are a source of elemental gaseous mercury in North America and could possibly be a contributor to the increase.

The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP), Canada's largest oil and gas lobby body and the only non-government body involved in the development of the joint monitoring program, has declined to comment on the results of the latest study.

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Suzanne Legault, Canada’s Information Commissioner, says federal officials are suppressing freedom of information in Canada.

“I am seeing signs of a system in crisis, where departments are unable to fulfill even their most basic obligations under the act,” she told a group of bureaucrats yesterday in a private meeting.

A copy of the watchdog’s speaking notes was obtained by The Canadian Press.

According to Legault new protocols and directives are thwarting the public’s access to information. She cited a Treasury Board directive, released in April of this year that instructs bureaucrats to exclude ministers’ offices from access-to-information document searches.

Some protection is afforded to information contained in a minister’s office due to a Supreme Court of Canada ruling in May of 2011, but this new directive oversteps the measures of that ruling.

“This new component is not found in the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision,” her speaking notes read. “In my view, it is potentially damaging to requesters’ rights.”

The directive in question also gives senior political staffers decision-making power over which documents are relevant to access-to-information requests, leaving ostensibly non-partisan decisions up to political actors.

Other points of concern for Leagult were unfulfilled requests, where information was unjustifiably refused or excluded from the Access to Information Act.

In addition, such unjustified delays were irresponsibly handled by departments.

Legault took the Department of National Defense to federal court for a 1,110-day extension under the Act, only to have the department release the documents a few weeks before her challenge in court.

“This type of case is not rare,” she said.

According to her notes, complaints to the Information Officer’s office in the first 5 months of the 2013-2014 year is up by 35 per cent. Complaints about departments claiming ‘no record exists’ in response to a request are also up by 34 per cent.

This week marks the annual Right to Know Week which promotes transparency in government.

Commissioner Legault also launched a formal investigation into the Harper Government’s systematic efforts to silence scientists and censor their engagement with the media. That investigation, launched after the release of a 128-page report by the University of Victoria’s Environmental Law Centre and Democracy Watch, is currently ongoing.

Legault has previously admitted this government is “not the most transparent,” and is a laggard in the Access to Information area. In 2011 less than 20 per cent of requests were fully disclosed. In early 2013, Legault claimed the government's transparency was at an all time low and requests for extension were at an all time high.

Poor access-to-information regimes "prevents Canadians from holding governments to account," she told the CBC back in February.

"Canadians should be angry," she said at the time. "It's really a fundamental democratic right in Canada [and] it's linked to freedom of expression."

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