Click here to read the Analysis
Click here to read the follow-up
Click here for a follow-up letter that CLD drafted
“The government’s proposals are, for the most part, positive”, said Toby Mendel, Executive Director of CLD. “But a far more ambitious set of reforms are needed to address the serious weaknesses of the current Quebec law.”
Some of the key recommendations in the CLD analysis are as follows:
• The law should apply to all information held or which can relatively easily be compiled by public bodies.
• Effective measures should be put in place to promote compliance by public bodies with the timelines in the law and the fees for providing information should be reduced.
• The regime of exceptions should be reviewed and amended to give proper effect to the proposal in Orientation No. 6, which calls for all exceptions to be strictly harm-based.
• The law should include a broad public interest override for all exceptions.
• Exceptions which are overbroad or unnecessary should be reviewed and repealed or amended.
• The oversight body, the Commission d’accès à l’information (CAI), should retain its current adjudicative function.
CLD urges the government of Quebec to revisit its proposals with a view to introducing more robust amendments to its right to information law.
For further information, please contact:
Toby Mendel
Executive Director
Centre for Law and Democracy
Email: toby@law-democracy.org
+1 902 431-3688
www.law-democracy.org
twitter: @law_democracy
