Earlier this summer, Information Commissioner John Reid released his final report on the ability of the federal government to respect the letter and spirit of the Access to Information Act (hereafter referred to as the Act).

To be fair, the Act does not allow Canadians carte blanche access to every government record on the books, nor should it. Exemptions from the Act include matters that could be harmful if released including some areas that deal with national security, law enforcement, commercial trade secrets, and personal data such as tax histories and medical records.

As a watchdog on government spending, we continuously use the Act to inform taxpayers of how their money is being spent and yes, we freely admit that this information dissemination is sometimes used to embarrass those who are responsible.

It's a sad commentary on democracy when Ministers (or other key decision makers) will only change policy direction once their misguided initiatives have been exposed as wasteful boondoggles.

The Act came into force in 1985 and has evolved as Canadians (mainly journalists and advocacy groups) have used it to understand how tax dollars are spent and misspent. But as more Canadians avail themselves of their right to know under the Act, the bureaucracy is still stuck with a bunker mentality mindset. As Mr. Reid notes, open government is the dream, not the reality.

A culture of secrecy still flourishes in too many high places even after 15 years of life under the Access to Information Act. Too many public officials cling to the old proprietorial notion that they, and not the Access to Information Act, should determine what and when information should be dispensed to the unwashed public.

In one way or another, all the checks and balances designed to limit abuses of government power are dependent upon there being access by outsiders to governments' insider information.

Mr. Reid goes on to state that the Act definitely needs strengthening and that the blame for the Act not living to its spirit of openness "must be placed at the feet of governments and public servants who have chosen to whine about the rigors of access rather than embrace its noble goals; chosen not to trust the public with information which taxes have paid for. The insult is equal only to the intellectual arrogance of it all."

Reid's report also listed the worst offenders who flout the Act by not responding in a timely fashion. Indeed, over 43% of the complaints logged by the Information Commissioner last year dealt with departmental delays. The top 5 offenders were:

National Defence

Citizenship & Immigration

Revenue Canada

Finance Canada

Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

The final problem with Access requests is one of inconsistency between departments. Some departments bend over backwards for you in fulfilling your request. Others charge computer processing fees up to $16.50/minute plus labour time - in complex requests, these costs can top $20,000. So much for access!

On a positive note, our experience with Industry Canada has been excellent. This is ironic given that we have used the information provided to expose the department's abysmal record of collecting on its corporate welfare loans.

Yet the culture of secrecy persists. In a recent flurry of requests that we have made, the barriers have once again been thrown up - from absolute denials to exorbitant fees to no response whatsoever, the culture of secrecy still flourishes.