CBC responsible for surge in information complaints: annual report
CBC responsible for surge in information complaints: annual report
OTTAWA — The Canadian Broadcasting Corp. is behind an unprecedented flood of complaints to Canada's information watchdog.
The latest annual report from Information Commissioner Robert Marleau says his office received 536 complaints about the public broadcaster in 2007-2008, more than any other department or agency of government.
And more than 90 per cent of the CBC complaints that Marleau has finished investigating were found to be valid.
Most of those complaints were about delays in responding to requests under the Access to Information Act, which for a $5 fee allows ordinary Canadians to ask for government documents and files.
Released today, Marleau's report notes that almost all of the CBC complaints came from a single source, which neither he nor the Crown corporation can name because of privacy rules.
The Federal Accountability Act made CBC subject to access law last Sept. 1, and the corporation has since been inundated with requests for information, including queries about expense claims filed by senior managers.
The public broadcaster announced last December that it was beefing up its access-to-information unit to cope with the large numbers of requests.
"CBC officials co-operated with us fully as we worked with them to establish target dates to respond to the requests," says the annual report.
"We worked with the complainant to prioritize some of them and reported weekly on CBC's progress."
Access-to-information legislation requires departments to respond within 30 days of receiving a request unless there is a legitimate reason for extending the time period.
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