The Harper Government Is Still Refusing to Give Our Transparency Watchdog Any Money

In March, VICE wrote about how Canada's access to information regime was broken, but how it could be fixed.

Now is a good time to give up hope and give in to despair.

Once the envy of the world, our Access to Information (ATI) system has fallen into utter disrepair as requests under the system have gone up, while staff and resources to answer them have gone down.

Under the system, Canadians—individuals, journalists, lawyers, corporations—can request just about any government document, subject to a raft of exemptions.

But thanks to that lack of resources, coupled with a culture of secrecy and distrust for political journalists that has permeated the government, the system has turned into a bit of a joke.

Last month, the RCMP released documents under the system to VICE where they redacted part of their own logo.

Meanwhile, the watchdog that's supposed to be overseeing this system has no money.

Suzanne Legault, the Information Commissioner of Canada, can receive complaints about uses of the ATI system and investigate departments that are suspected of playing fast and loose with the big black marker. If they don't comply, she can launch lawsuits against them.

But as VICE reported in March, the office's $11 million budget is so tight, her programming is severely hobbled.

By way of comparison, Legault's budget is $3 million smaller than the National Battlefield Commission, which runs two parks in Quebec.

So VICE cornered Tony Clement, President of the Treasury Board and minister technically responsible for assessing Legault's funding requests, to ask why the office was so cash-starved, and why he was so optimistic about a system that everyone says is broken. What ensued was a testy seven-minute back-and-forth.

"Well, she's entitled to her opinions of course. I think the numbers speak for themselves—over 59,000 Access to Information requests processed last year, a nine percent increase, a 36 percent increase of processing over the last two years, six million pages processed. So I think those numbers are quite astoundingly good," Clement said in the foyer of the House of Commons.

The minister's memorized statistics are, indeed, correct. But complaints and redactions are also on the rise.

I asked just whether the government planned on increasing the office's budget.

"Well, this is very frustrating because she knows what the process is. She needs to go to the Parliament of Canada and make a request," Clement said.

"She has," I said, pointing out that she actually filed a report that specifically details how she's lacking money. Clement said she should be using her budget more wisely.

"I'm not in charge of her request for more money," he added. He's sort-of right, in that the Minister of Finance releases the budget. His office, however, receives the commissioner's reports and requests for funding. "She knows the process. I encourage her to go through the process rather than complaining to the media,"

Fellow Hill journalist Alex Boutilier pointed out that she actually made the request in a public report, as well as before a Parliamentary committee, where she was specifically asked about it.

"Good for her," the minister responded.

From there, a bit more squabbling with the minister continued. But his message was clear: There is no problem, and Legault has all the money she needs.

Legault testified before a committee on Monday, where she appeared to be genuinely flabbergasted by Clement's logic.

"The truth is we have followed all the appropriate lines in order to seek and obtain this funding. Whether that's disingenuous of the President of the Treasury Board, I think you would have to ask that question of Minister Clement," she said.

NDP Member of Parliament Pat Martin asked: "Does your office have adequate funding to meet its responsibilities?"

"No," Legault said.

Neither do the departments—the ones who control the black marker—it seems. The Toronto Star reported Tuesday that interns are the ones handling ATI requests in some departments.

VICE again tried to ask Clement why Legault wasn't getting any money. He repeated that she wasn't going through the proper channels.

"Other officers of Parliament have had the ability to do better with less. Why she is in some way thinking that she's special?" he added.

Clement says he's still reviewing Legault's recommendations, of which she has many, and that he doesn't know when the decisions will be made.

Okay, so why should you care?

An ungodly amount of Canada's investigative journalism comes about thanks to the ATI system.

VICE has broken stories about government surveillance, drone regulation, and prison cellphone jamming, thanks to records obtained through the system. I've written things about Canada lobbying against Palestine at the UN and surveilling First Nations activists. The Canadian Press used the system to reveal the huge scheme to market Canadian oil. The National Post got documents revealing that Canadians may be part of an elite al Qaeda offshoot. CBC filed request to prove that temporary foreign workers have been caught in limbo, waiting for their permanent residency.

On top of that, immigration and refugee lawyers use the system to obtain information about their clients' efforts to stay within the country. Corporations use the system to get statistics that the government is refusing to put out. Individuals can use the system to obtain personal information about themselves that has been collected by the government.

It's no big surprise that the government is no big fan of a program that exposes the government's secrets.

The opposition NDP and Liberals have both committed to fixing the ATI system if they win power.

So maybe we can all look forward to watching a different prime minister try to shut down Canada's transparency system.

Follow Justin Ling on Twitter.