Commentary
Artificial intelligence another avenue for government to thwart transparency
By Ken Rubin
Treasury Board rules note that departments should categorize just how risky their planned uses of AI are. Those algorithm impact assessments could help the public understand the risks and uses of AI. Under the current broad exemptions of the Access to Information and Privacy Acts, the details of departmental AI use could be denied as being proprietary or matters of national security, law enforcement and government economic interest.
February 17, 2021
Payette goes, but secrecy remains
By Ken Rubin
February 1, 2021 - Julie Payette leaves, but picking up the pieces means more than a little house cleaning. It requires radical transparency changes. Let's give Canadians the tools they need to monitor and improve those hiding from us.
There's No Excuse for Stifling Information
By Ken Rubin
December 21, 2020 - Trudeau isn't transparent enough; Some agencies have simply placed requests for information from the public on hold, despite this being a violation of the Access to Information Act.
Honey, the Pandemic shrunk transparency
By Ken Rubin
Novemeber 9, 2020 - It's time for the government to take off the mask that disguises and robs us of our public right to know. Trustworthy and revitalized government requires effective access and more public scrutiny.
Review won't fix Canada's Access to Information law significantly, Ken Rubin Ottawa Citizen August 10, 2020 A9
By Ken Rubin
August 10, 2020 - There's no real desire to remedy shortcomings. It is no longer good enough to continue holding Canadians hostage to incomplete data
Troubled Times for Transparency Call for Change
By Ken Rubin
Shocking revelations and events can stir the public. But that does not mean officials want to give up systemic secrecy practices and bring in wholesale corrective changes.
During COVID-19, government transparency takes a beating
By Ken Rubin
April 25, 2020 - Secrecy and autocratic, erratic government should not become the new normal during or after the COVID-19 crisis. Rather, as former health minister Jane Philpott (currently working at COVID-19 intake centre) has said, what is needed is “radical transparency” to keep Canadians abreast of developments.
COVID-19 Invades and Compromises Our Privacy
By Ken Rubin
April 20, 2020 - COVID-19 puts privacy rights under attack. Zoom-bomers, COVID-19 scammers, and cellphone trackers are gaining ground as Canadians self-isolate.
Three Trudeau ministers among those stalling access to information requests
By Ken Rubin
June 17, 2019 - The ministers overseeing Health, Justice and Innovation departments must do a better job of living up to the prime minister's promises of transparency.
Why the secrecy on this "expert" centre?
By Ken Rubin
June 13, 2019 - Public Safety has quietly set up a centre for expertise to assist security and intelligence departments in the responsible use of the Security of Canada Information Disclosure Act, known as SCIDA. Yet vitually no one knows about the centre, or what it is doing. This is worrisome.
The Judges Win, Bill C-58 Gets to the Top of The Senate List for Quick Passage
By Ken Rubin
April 29, 2019 - Judging from the Senators' orchestrated recent cave-in removing the public from getting individual judges expenses, Canada's access to information act is well on its way to being made irrelevant.
Massive Secrecy Inroads and Barriers to Access Near Approval in the Senate
By Ken Rubin
April 1, 2019 - The Senate Legal and Constitutional Committee is winding its way, clause by clause through Bill C-58. But they have already approved the most divisive change to the Access to Information Act.
At the intersection of democracy, transit and Sidewalk Toronto
By Milan Gokhale - March 4, 2019 - To solve Toronto transit cuts, we urgently require more democracy. Sidewalk Toronto is taking us in the opposite direction.
Another year, more government secrecy
By Ken Rubin
January 28, 2019 - The new year brings with it at least four basic problems that put transparency under threat.
Problem one: “pro-active” sanitized data and propaganda dominates Bill C-58
We’re not done talking about Privacy in the Smart City
By Brenda McPhail and Nabeel Ahmed - January 24, 2019 - Since Sidewalk Labs and Waterfront Toronto announced their agreement to develop a plan for a Quayside smart city project, privacy concerns have been a big part of the conversation.
The waterfront toronto crisis: what are the options?
By Nabeel Ahmed and Mariana Valverde - December 7, 2018 - On Wednesday, Ontario’s Auditor General (AG) released her annual report in which she highlighted a series of serious internal governance issues facing Waterfront Toronto (WT). Most crucially for the future of the Quayside smart city development, the report concluded that WT entered into an agreement with Sidewalk Labs “without sufficient due diligence and provincial involvement”.
Questions to Consider Heading Into Sidewalk Toronto’s Fourth Public Meeting Tomorrow
By Bianca Wylie and Melissa Goldstein - December 7, 2018 - Since the start of the Sidewalk Toronto project, community members have been creating a running list of questions for the Sidewalk Toronto project team. Many of them remain unanswered.
Untangling Quayside & Sidewalk Toronto – Updates and Narratives
By Nabeel Ahmed - December 3, 2018 - As 2018 comes to a close, there has been a tremendous amount of activity in Toronto on the smart city front. This post provides a recap of some of this activity (including updates to the timing and process), identifies four narratives about the smart city that need to be examined closely, and looks ahead to what is coming up and how Torontonians are talking about alternative urban futures.
In Libraries We Trust
By Milan Gokhale - November 20, 2018 - To be a world-class digital city, Toronto must make the public library — not Google — its core institution of trust.
Brison's Ingenious Selling of Bill C-58 to the Senate
By Ken Rubin
October 15, 2018 - Treasury Board President Scott Brison was hard at it on October 3 selling Bill C-58 as a great transparency advance, which it is not.
Towards a more equitable Sidewalk Toronto
By Milan Gokhale - October 27, 2018 - Sidewalk Labs says they will not get preferential access to data collected. Why should they get access to any data at all?
The Digital Strategy Advisory Panel stands up
By Nabeel Ahmed - October 20, 2018 - Five months and four meetings after it was first constituted, the Waterfront Toronto Digital Strategy Advisory Panel finally kicked into gear. In keeping with how the Sidewalk Toronto project has proceeded, it was a bit of stop-start ride.
The Transparency Rot Runs Deep
By Ken Rubin
July 23, 2018 - Canada's broken access to information system has increasingly become entrenched, complete with backlog specialists and a new Information Commissioner facing her office's own backlog.
Feds Want a More Restrictive Transparency Regime
By Ken Rubin
October 9, 2017 - Successive bureaucrats have wanted to put dampers on the public use of access to information legislation. Now they have found hope in Bill C-58 and a willing dupe in Treasury Board President Scott Brison.
The Need for Greater Corporate Transparency
By Ken Rubin
Corporate transparency should be a priority. In this two-part series, Ken Rubin describes his fight to get car insurance lobby records from the Ontario Finance Ministry that reveal their close ties and how the Finance Ministry spent millions on consultants whose reports were designed to help advance the car insurance industry agenda and profits.
The perils and paradoxes of FOI in Canada
By Ken Rubin
March 3, 2015 - Ken Rubin is an investigative public interest researcher, author and Senior Fellow at the Centre for Free Expression