NEWS RELEASE

May 2, 2001                                                                                                               For Immediate Release

  BILL WOULD LIMIT GOVERNMENT USE OF “CABINET SECRECY” TO HIDE THE TRUTH

“Hundreds of pages of public documents are being hidden to save Liberals from political embarrassment.”

  Ottawa – Today, Garry Breitkreuz, MP for Yorkton-Melville, introduced a Private Member’s Bill designed to limit the government’s ability to withhold public information by calling it a Cabinet secret.  “Anything the government wants to hide from the prying eyes of the public or Parliament, they call it a ‘Cabinet confidence’ and not even the Information Commissioner of Canada has the right to see it,” explained Breitkreuz.  “My bill is the first attempt at trying to fix this flaw in the Access to Information Act since the Information Commissioner first recommended it five years ago.”

  Here is the statement Breitkreuz made when he introduced, An Act to amend the Access to Information Act (Cabinet confidences):

Last week, Treasury Board kept secret 33 full pages of documents and an additional 57 partial pages using the excuse of “Cabinet confidences”.  All the documents pertained to a Treasury Board Firearms “Oversight” Committee that has been reviewing the huge cost overruns and bureaucratic bungling in the gun registry.

The Dept. of Justice has used the same Cabinet secrecy excuse repeatedly to hide:

-          172 pages of gun registry budget documents

-          An entire 115-page document on the economic cost of the gun registry

-          61 pages on how user fees will cover the entire cost of the gun registry program.

In 1996, the Information Commissioner published a report titled, “The Access to Information Act and Cabinet confidences – A Discussion of New Approaches.”  My Private Members’ Bill would implement the Information Commissioner’s recommendations. The Information Commissioner was kind enough to review an earlier version of my bill and his recommendations have been included in this draft.  This bill should reduce some of the complaints of government secrecy which the Information Commissioner says have more than doubled in the last year.

  Summary:  This bill makes Cabinet confidences mandatory exemptions as opposed to exclusions.  This results in the withholding of information and documents that are considered Cabinet confidences being subject to independent review under the Act, rather that the entire Act being inapplicable to them.  The bill also excludes from the exemption, documents that refer to but do not reveal the substance of Cabinet confidences.  The bill also shortens the exemption period for Cabinet confidences from twenty to fifteen years.   Among other safeguards, this bill would require that the review of requests for Cabinet confidences be handled only by the Information Commissioner, the Assistant Commissioner or other officers who have received the appropriate security clearance.

  Breitkreuz admitted, “The chance of this Private Members Bill becoming law with the Liberals in power are slim.  But Canadians need to know some one in Parliament is fighting for their right to know.  Stonewalling has become the cornerstone of the way this government operates.  On Page 92 of the 1993 Red Book it boldly stated, “Open government will be the watchword of the Liberal Program.”  Breitkreuz concluded, “How they vote on this bill will determine if they stand by this statement or if it’s just another broken promise.”

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