ST. JOHN’S, N.L. — Memorial University in Newfoundland and Labrador agreed to spend $13,800 on outside public relations help as questions arose about its former president’s claims of Indigenous heritage. A contract obtained through access-to-information legislation shows National Public Relations offered the university’s board of regents “communications counsel around a sensitive issue involving its president.” […]

BEIJING (AP) — China sentenced a 78-year-old United States citizen to life in prison Monday on spying charges, in a case that could exacerbate the deterioration in ties between Beijing and Washington over recent years. Details of the charges against John Shing-Wan Leung, who also holds permanent residency in Hong Kong, have not been publicly […]

OTTAWA — A culture within Canada’s cyberspy service of “resisting and impeding” independent review has frustrated efforts to ensure it is obeying the law, say newly released documents from the federal intelligence watchdog. The unusually candid National Security and Intelligence Review Agency records from 2021 are the latest evidence of the watchdog’s irritation at trying […]

Some of the largest U.S. cities challenging their 2020 census numbers aren’t getting the results they hoped for from the U.S. Census Bureau — an effort by Memphis to increase its official population resulted in three people being subtracted from its count during an initial appeal. Some successes have come from challenges to totals of […]

OTTAWA — Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos was warned that pharmaceutical companies had steadfastly refused to engage on drug-price reforms before he urged an independent federal agency to pause those reforms in favour of more consultation, a 2021 memo shows. The NDP, which obtained the memo through access-to-information law and shared it with The Canadian Press, […]

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican’s main charitable organization, Caritas Internationalis, is hoping to open a new chapter this week after Pope Francis fired top managers over bullying complaints. But the recently ousted head is fighting back, claiming the Vatican engaged in a “brutal power grab” fueled by a “colonialist” attitude. The drama is playing […]

American fishing boats catching threatened Canadian salmon was flagged as a top concern for federal Fisheries Minister Joyce Murray before meeting with the U.S. ambassador to Canada in March. Briefing notes, which Canada’s National Observer obtained through an access-to-information request, identify the issue as a key point for Murray to raise with U.S. Ambassador David […]

EDMONTON — Former members of an elite Alberta wildfire-fighting crew say government budget cuts have left the province battling its current blazes short-handed. “We could have been difference-makers,” said Jordan Erlandson, a former member of Alberta’s Rapattack team. Those firefighters were trained to rappel from helicopters to get at wildfires while they still only covered […]

FIPA will always maintain and recognize that timeliness is a core performance measure in freedom of information. Access delayed is access denied.  We also feel the need to avoid the insanity of repeating the same actions and expecting different results. Timeliness is not the only factor.  Our fundamental question: How do we evaluate the performance […]

For the past 30 years. FIPA’s advocacy has focused on the timeliness of the freedom of information process. We have been informed by the belief that access delayed is access denied. Unfortunately, little has changed or improved. Governments fail to meet deadlines, civil society and users complain, the next verse is the same as the […]

Quadra Island resident Carol Woolsey had the misfortune to experience a medical emergency in her rural community last month after the last ferry had sailed for the night. After developing searing pain in her lower abdomen, the 77-year-old and her cousin called 911 around 10 p.m. on April 2. Disoriented by pain and vomiting constantly […]

A Canadian forestry professor’s critical views on a controversial herbicide were not the reason he was fired, but nonetheless, his termination was unjust, a judge has ruled. Rod Cumberland, previously employed at the Maritime College of Forest Technology in New Brunswick, was fired from his post in 2019 after creating “a toxic atmosphere” at the […]