NDP REALITY CHECK: Just the Facts on the “most transparent Government in Canadian History”

"Our Government is the most transparent government in Canadian history” - Tony Clement, December 19, 2012

How are Conservatives really doing? According to the most recent Access to Information Act Bulletin, last year:

• The percentage of requests completed within 30 days went down – now only 39% of ATI requests are answered by the statutory deadline.
• The percentage of requests that took more than 120 days to complete went up – now more than 10% of requests don’t even come back close to the deadline.
• The number of times “cabinet confidence” was invoked to prevent the release of information has exploded, up almost 50% from last year.

By all these measures, the average performance of the Access to Information system has been even worse under this Conservative government than it was under the previous Liberal government. That’s nothing to be proud of.

“When Conservatives say they’re running the most transparent government in history, what they mean is that they’ve mastered the art of secrecy,” said NDP MP Charlie Angus. “This information belongs to all Canadians, not just Conservative insiders.”