VICTORIA: The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) responded today to government legislation it says will choke off transparency and accountability. "It's shameful that this government-which promised to be the most open, accountable and democratic government in Canada-would introduce legislation to effectively shut off public scrutiny. It's the ultimate act of hypocrisy," said Sara MacIntyre, BC director for the CTF.

The government introduced Bill 30, Miscellaneous Statutes and Bill 23, Public Inquiry Act to the legislature this week. Bill 30 is a set of amendments to the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA) that provide a blanket of exemptions, gutting government accountability. Bill 30 deals with public inquiries gives the government complete discretion with respect to disclosing the findings of a public inquiry and allows the government to terminate a public inquiry or arbitrarily change its terms of reference without notice.

"Incredibly, this government's only legislative agenda this session is to squeeze public access to government documents. The new FIPPA amendments, for example, grant numerous exemptions including the disclosure of government contracts," noted MacIntyre. "Haven't we learned anything from the Sponsorship scandal The lack of transparency and accountability of federal advertising contracts allowed taxpayers money to be funneled back to ad executives. Now, the BC government wants to exclude government contracts from the Freedom of Information provisions. The only question to ask is, why "

In a letter to Minister Mike de Jong, Information Commissioner, David Loukidelis responded to the government's new amendments with great apprehension. "I suggest that transparency is more, not less, important in relation to long-term, high-value, contracts under which the public sector's capacity to deliver a particular pubic service may be handed over to a private sector service provider-.The price of doing business with government is a degree of scrutiny not found in purely private business deals."

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation strongly urges the government to withdraw Bill 30 and significantly amend the Public Inquiry Act.