BC Freedom of Information and Privacy Association
Your Data Your Rights
BC Ministry caught red-handed in abuse of freedom of information act
A reporter for the Victoria Times-Colonist has thrown light on how the BC government abuses the freedom of information process to improperly withhold sensitive information from the public.
Relying on sweeping sections of the province’s freedom of information law, the Ministry of Children and Family Development tried to block the Times Colonist newspaper from getting its hands on key aspects of a report completed last year on the province’s Sexual Abuse Intervention Program (SAIP).
The ministry censored portions of the April 2006 report using sections of the law that permit withholding material “that would reveal advice or recommendations” to a minister or material that would harm “the financial or economic interests of a public body.”
Reporter Lindsay Kines, however, managed to obtain a leaked, uncensored copy of the same review, which reveals precisely what the ministry didn’t want you to see.
Categories
Access to Information
Tags
A reporter for the Victoria Times-Colonist has thrown light on how the BC government abuses the freedom of information process to improperly withhold sensitive information from the public.
Relying on sweeping sections of the province’s freedom of information law, the Ministry of Children and Family Development tried to block the Times Colonist newspaper from getting its hands on key aspects of a report completed last year on the province’s Sexual Abuse Intervention Program (SAIP).
The ministry censored portions of the April 2006 report using sections of the law that permit withholding material “that would reveal advice or recommendations” to a minister or material that would harm “the financial or economic interests of a public body.”
Reporter Lindsay Kines, however, managed to obtain a leaked, uncensored copy of the same review, which reveals precisely what the ministry didn’t want you to see.
Categories
Access to InformationTags