PHOTOS: Government documents. Really! (Photo: Libraries and Archives Canada.) Legislators in Ottawa need to get cracking to make Canada’s Crown copyright law responsive to the needs of the citizens of…
The idea of open data has been around for a while. In government, it means that government would make information like census data, statistics, licensing information easily and freely available…
Here, on how the City of Regina's actual treatment of key information runs contrary to its stated commitment to open government.For further reading...- Natascia Lypny's report on the City's delays…
This and that for your Sunday reading.- Robert Frank comments on the connection between recognizing the luck and social support which lead to one's own success, and being willing to…
This and that for your Sunday reading.- John Ross makes the case for a focus on the social determinants of health in all kinds of public policy-making:Many studies show that…
Memo to Don Lenihan: It’s well and good to point to past backroom policy debacles such as utterly unwanted Crown corporation giveaways as examples of a complete lack of public…
Brent for Area B OCP – Community Vision Incorporation Study Citizen Involvement Open Government Brent at the Focus News Updates Taxes Who Am I? My name is Brent Beach. I…
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Edward Robinson laments the willingness of European centre-left parties to abandon any attempt to argue against austerity even when the evidence shows…
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Tim Harper and the Star’s editorial board each offer up some hope that 2014 will be a more productive year in politics than…
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Thomas Walkom writes that the Harper Cons’ much-hyped economic record in fact offers ample reason to demand a change in government: The Conservatives…
One of the most obvious sources of cynicism in politics – which the NDP should be seeking to combat at every turn – is the presence of issues where opposition…
I don’t know. Do you? No. And, it seems, we won’t be permitted to determine if the BC Liberal government is lying to us about their future vision of rolling…
MPs are back at work and, under the Harper regime, that means that they are once again spending a considerable portion of their “public” time actually meeting behind closed doors,…
Ms. Redford’s expectation that the price of oil would stay high (we’re currently hitting a nine-month low for oil), her spending promises be fulfilled, and that a PC government would…
After an appallingly inaccurate CP report on Parliamentary secrecy a couple of montsh ago, Sixth Estate began tracking the amount of time that Parliamentary committees spend in camera, meaning in…
These are tough days for Canada’s parliamentary democracy. Having endured years of steady erosion, it is now under frontal attack. Journalists and public leaders, across the political spectrum, have begun…
Top cop concerned with Mounties airing problems in public RCMP Commissioner says bill will help end ‘outrageous’ behaviour “1984, knocking at your door…” What is it about the CRAPs that…
A couple weeks after CP spread a nasty and false rumour that Chretien and Martin ran Parliament far more secretively than Stephen Harper does, electronic versions of its hit piece…
My study of Parliamentary secrecy, rejuvenated by CP’s bogus numbers claiming to prove that the Martin majority was much more secretive than the Harper majority, continues. Unlike the House as…
As promised, I am conducting a fact-checking inquiry into the recent news report alleging, contrary to routine media reports of growing secrecy under the Harper government, that actually Martin’s brief…
