BC FIPA has responded to the Federal Government consultation on the Open Government Partnership commitments with a highly critical examination of the government’s approach. Lack of transparency is a serious issue in this country, and not just for this government. However, the Government of Canada labours under the most archaic Access to Information law, and […]

What is the BC Services Card? It’s an ID card that combines both the drivers license and the provincial health care card.   Is that all it does? Doesn’t sound too scary to me. Right now that is all it does. However, it is a key part of the ‘Government 2.0’ plan, which will link […]

A new report from Information and Privacy Commissioner Elizabeth Denham reviewing the performance of the Government of British Columbia’s ‘open government’ initiative calls the open information component “the weakest component of the policy”. This is a large initiative, covering a number of different areas, and so the results do vary. But the overall, they are […]

BC FIPA’s intervener’s factum in SCC 34828 (case docket at SCC website).  BC FIPA takes the position that greater deference to the adjudicative tribunal should have been taken by the lower court and that “access to information legislation, such as in Ontario and British Columbia, fulfils a particularly critical role in nourishing our democracy. It creates […]

In anticipation of the 2013 academic year, the B.C. Freedom of Information and Privacy Association, with the generous support of the Law Foundation of British Columbia, is excited to announce the upcoming release of Access in the Academy: Bringing ATI and FOI to Academic Research, available for download starting July 25th. Compiled by Mike Larsen, […]

In this issue: BC Election: It’s time to double down on info rights BC Election Act causes confusion, chills free speech — again Major data security issues bedevil the Federal Government A National ID Card by Stealth? Fighting for a fair deal: FIPA continues to oppose Trans-Pacific Partnership FIPA is hiring! Join the team Access […]

The B.C. Freedom of Information and Privacy Association has joined together with civil liberties, pro-democracy, privacy, and open internet advocacy groups across the country to demand answers and immediate action from the government after it was revealed that a secretive government agency has been spying on the telephone and Internet activities of individuals, including law-abiding […]

Another of Canada’s Information Commissioners has found that the problem of oral government has taken hold at the highest levels of provincial power. Ann Cavoukian, Ontario’s Information and Privacy Commissioner, issued a report yesterday exposing “[a] culture of avoiding the creation of written documentation” in the “offices of the former Minister of Energy and the […]

After four weeks of heated campaigning, the 2013 provincial election is finally over. The voters of B.C. have chosen a new Liberal majority government under Christy Clark to lead the province for the next four years. The coming weeks will see a new cabinet appointed, staff shuffled and (at least the possibility of) new faces […]

To this point in the provincial election campaign, the leaders of the four major parties have been quite reticent to reveal where they stand on some of the burning issues in the field of information rights. That’s why we sent all four parties a questionnaire pushing them for clear positions on how they would stop […]

The provincial election campaign is well underway and all the major parties have released their platforms. But unfortunately for those of us concerned about information and privacy rights, the pickings are awfully slim. Information issues were smoking hot right up to the drop of the writ. But ever since, they’ve received hardly a mention. Looks […]

A few short days from now, the writ will drop on the 2013 provincial election, kicking off twenty-eight days of heated campaigning. And while there’s no shortage of issues for voters to consider, recent controversies around government secrecy and attempts to undermine Freedom of Information make it clear that information policy should be a top […]