Transparency & accountability

CPRN: RIP – the loss of an independent voice

Oct 30, 2009
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There was sad news yesterday for those of us who are policy wonks and for anyone else who pays serious attention to public issues in Canada. After 15 years of public policy research the Canadian Policy Research Network is closing its doors.  The organization’s president, Dr. Sharon Manson Singer announced they were no longer financially… View Article

The recent secretive, haphazard spending cuts should be repealed

Sep 23, 2009
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Almost daily we wake up to news of yet another important program or initiative whose funding has been cut by the BC government. Literacy initiatives, high school sports, programs that protect women and children from violence, arts and culture: hardly an area of social service provision has been spared. These cuts have been devastating to… View Article

Piecing together the puzzle: help us track BC government cuts

Sep 17, 2009
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Since winning the May election, the provincial government has been steadily cutting public services, often without any public announcement. These cuts affect services ranging from the arts to seniors’ care to public schools. They will be particularly hard on the most vulnerable members of our society. In the absence of comprehensive information from the provincial… View Article

Report finds government stonewalling on FOI requests

May 8, 2009
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BC’s Freedom of Information and Privacy Association (FIPA) released a report yesterday showing secrecy in government is even a bigger problem that we thought. A February report from BC’s Information and Privacy Commissioner’s described what he called, “an unacceptable pattern of government-wide failure to respond to access requests in as timely a fashion as it… View Article

Government compliance with legal obligations far from good

Feb 15, 2009
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BC’s Freedom of Information Commissioner released his annual report last Friday. These reports are a pretty good indication of how open and transparent our government is. The Commissioner is unhappy and he says so in tough language: The stark fact is that the government’s overall record of compliance with its legal obligations under FIPPA is… View Article

Obama opens doors closed in BC

Jan 25, 2009
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One of President Barack Obama’s first acts was to reverse an order from the Bush regime that undermined Freedom of Information requests. What a contrast to the British Columbia government. In opposition Gordon Campbell was a big freedom of Information supporter. In 1998 he wrote to the Freedom of Information and Privacy Association saying: The… View Article