All posts by Kyle Duggan

Information Commissioner Concerned Over Closed Departments’ Transparency Measures, Government Isn’t

Access-to-information story
Share

Canada’s information watchdog is voicing concerns the federal government doesn’t have a system in place to deal with Access to Information requests when a department closes down.

In a document obtained through access to information, Suzanne Legault, the Information Commissioner of Canada, said in a letter to Treasury Board President Tony Clement in April 2013 the system lacks “clear transitional measures” and at least once a closure infringed on the rights of a document requester.

Access to information is a transparency system that allows the public to access government documents through filing requests.

Legault cited 16 closed or merged departments which could run into this problem, ranging from the Pension Appeal Board to the Wheat Board, and said she is starting a review to see if any other institutions could be affected.

Clement’s office, which oversees the access to information system, wrote back dismissing the problem, saying when a department closes the Librarian and Archivist of Canada takes control of those documents.

It said when institutions are closed or joined, “the existing Records Disposition Authorities, as issued by Library and Archives Canada, survive and continue to apply within the new organization.”

In an emailed statement, Legault said she’s concerned it still doesn’t seem as if “sufficient safeguards” have been put in place to “ensure the integrity of the public’s right of access to information held by the institutions that have been wound down or amalgamated.”

The issue originally arose when the International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development closed and a requester couldn’t get their documents.

Since then, some of those documents have gone to Library and Archives Canada, while others went to the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

Ann Curry, a professor in Communication and Technology at University of Alberta who studies access to information and privacy, said Library and Archives shouldn’t have to deal with old access request files from closed departments.

“They’ve been so gutted with their staff and programs that they can’t cope,” she said.

“Having that government department absolve itself of responsibility by putting it on Library and Archives Canada, which they themselves are not funding, I think is a shameful situation.”

She also cited lack of funding for information management in departments as a key problem in this area.

“We should listen to our information and privacy professionals,” Curry said. “They have called for a close look at our access to information laws and privacy laws and said they’re out of date, and I agree.”

Toby Mendel, Executive Director of the Centre for Law and Democracy, says this issue shows problems with the access to information system but much more basic concerns should take front seat.

He said the scope of the law is too limited, exceptions are too broad, not all aspects of government are covered and there are no clear and fixed time lines for getting documents back.

“There’s no limit to the amount of time public bodies can give themselves to respond to a request. The courts are allowing more than three year extensions. That’s something I think the average guy on the street can understand is ridiculous.”

His organization puts out a joint rating of countries’ access to information laws, which ranks Canada as 55th in the world, out of 92 countries for its access to information legislation.

Mendel said the law was first adopted in 1982 and considered progressive at the time, but nothing substantial has changed since then.

“In a nutshell, it’s very weak.”

Documents obtained through Access to Information (see notes for relevant pages):

A 2013 00011 AM (Text)
Access to Information correspondence with other departments and levels of government:

ATIP Correspondence (Text)

Canada arms exports continue to rise, explosives sales double in 2013

Database Assignment
Share

As Canada continues to ship out more arms to countries around the world, critics are concerned deadly weapons are going to countries with questionable human rights records — and it’s not clear which organizations in those countries are the ones buying.

An analysis of Industry Canada arms exports data shows a category of explosives covering bombs, torpedoes, grenades, mines and more, increased by 51 per cent to $126.7-million in 2013.

That included a $13.9-million dollar deal with Saudi Arabia, which last bought those kinds of weapons — only one thousand dollars worth — in 2011.



Click here for an interactive map of where Canada sells explosive ammunition.

Another group of weapons including rocket and grenade launchers, flamethrowers and other propellers increased by 11 per cent, with Colombia now on the list of customers.

In total, sales of arms — excluding lesser weapons like swords, bayonets and air gun pellets — went up by 29 per cent, but the Industry Canada dataset doesn’t include more costlier things it exports, like like transport carriers or jet fighters.

A big chunk of both of these sales went to the U.S. and U.K., but over the last few years Canada has also started selling more to countries like Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Iraq.

Steven Staples, a policy analyst from the Rideau Institute, an Ottawa-based advocacy group that’s been critical of Canada’s arms trade, said there should be more stringent rules about where arms exports go and the country should close loopholes that fast-track contract reviews.

As Canada starts to sells more to places like Colombia and Saudi Arabia, he said, “it’s hard to imagine having any policy in place that can prevent Canadian arms exports from going to human rights abusers.”

Staples said the Canadian defence industry expanded during 9/11 and Afghanistan, and as it winds down it’s looking to replace orders with arms exports to more countries.

“This kind of cycle is the same thing that happened at the end of the Cold War,” he said. Staples said this is also why the government doesn’t want to sign the UN arms trade treaty.

But Walter Dorn, a professor of Defence Studies at the Royal Military College of Canada, said the government hasn’t signed the treaty largely because it’s concerned how it could affect domestic sports arms sales.

“The U.S. government can overcome the National Rifle Association, why can’t Canada overcome internal opposition?”

Dorn said the answer to the human rights exporting concern is simple: “where there are human rights violations by government, don’t ship them arms.”

“Some of those countries are human rights violators, no doubt Saudi Arabia,” he said.

“We should be even more transparent so we can know what arms ship to who,” Dorn said.

He said right now we know it’s shipped to a country but not whether it goes to governments, companies, individuals or rebel forces.

The federal government made it a point in the 2014 budget it’s looking to expand arms manufacturing and exports, and has said it’s focusing its foreign policy primarily on trade.


Last month, the government made a major announcement that it helped secure a $10-billion US deal for General Dynamics to sell armoured vehicles to Saudi Arabia.

Derek Lothian, a spokesperson for the Canada Manufacturers and Exporters association, said deals like that provide a level of stability to the manufacturing sector.

“Military procurement is a more stable, long term market.”

He said Saudi Arabia has been “a long-time ally of both Canada and the United States.”

“I view it as a positive. It’s better for us to deal with our partners around the world. It’s not a bad thing – they’re going to get it from somewhere.”

He said the increase in arms exports, in general, is reflective of the world we live in.

“I don’t think it’s going to slow down anytime soon.”

25 years after Exxon Valdez, environmentalists say Canadian tanker policy still doesn’t hold water

Whatever-Happened-To? Assignment
Share

Twenty five years after the Exxon Valdez crashed in Prince William Sound, Alaska, spilling some 11 million gallons of oil, its shadow is still cast over oil tanker policy debate.

As Canada considers increasing oil tanker shipments with the Northern Gateway project, which would add over 200 oil tankers on the B.C. coast a year, environmentalists charge Canada isn’t prepared for spills.

Karen Wristen heads Living Oceans, a B.C. based environmental group calling for a ban on oil tankers near the B.C. coast.

“The first step of prevention for a marine oil spill would be to keep the oil we have on the continent and use it for Canada’s energy security.”

She said Canada’s tanker regulation framework doesn’t adequately cover prevention, response or compensation.

“Immediately south of the boarder there’s a far better example of a regulatory regime equipped to deal with oil,” she said. “Our own is virtually non-existent.”

The U.S. put in place tighter regulations following the Exxon Valdez spill and Canada followed suit with its own policy review.

It changed the Canada Shipping Act, making polluters legally responsible for spill preparedness, paying for damages and creating private sector pollution response organizations.

Canada also now only allows double-hull tankers, which are better for controlling spills, and recently announced more monitoring and prevention measures as opponents voice concerns over ramping up oil exports.

But Wristen said meantime the coastguard has seen cutbacks, regional emergency response personnel have been moved out of province and there’s no West Coast response plan.

And so far B.C.’s inner coasts have had a “voluntary tanker exclusion zone” which keeps tankers away from risky areas. “Of course we’ve got a good track record. We haven’t had to deal with the traffic,” Wristen said.

That’s not how industry sees it. Philip John is the marine fleet manager at the Woodward Group of Companies.

“Canada’s current shipping regulation framework is among the strictest in the world and it’s proved to be very effective,” he said.

In a 2012 policy paper that argues Canada should export more oil off the West Coast, he said the number of reported shipping accidents in Canadian waters declined by as much as 38 per cent over the previous ten years.

He said industry knows they’re well policed so they comply with regulations before they have to be enforced.

John said enforcing a ban would force oil to get shipped by other means, and recent rail disasters like the one in Lac-Megantic have shown marine shipping is less risky.

“Since Exxon Valdez, there has been really no major oil spill. So the marine industry is probably the safest bet.”

Scott Pegau researches herring fish stocks in Prince William Sound, Alaska, and directs the Oil Spill Recovery Institute, which was created in response to the Exxon spill.

“If you were visiting here, you’d never know where it was,” he said.

On a sunny day there it’s picturesque with sparkling ocean water, mountain ranges that shoot up out of the ocean, and plenty of whales and wildlife.

He said it’s very difficult to recover oil from a major spill: only about 8 per cent can be picked up.

“There’s a fair amount out there but it’s not easy to find,” he said.

Much of it is still trapped in layers of sediment. But sea otters and other animals become exposed when they dig it back up.

And the area still hasn’t recovered from a major drop in herring stocks following the spill — although there’s debate over whether the oil caused the fish to disappear.

“It’s affected a lot of families here. They actually still all hold onto their permits in hopes there will be a herring fishery sometime soon.”

While the spill remains a symbolic image of environmental destruction, Pegau said the community’s blackest day was when the U.S. Supreme Court significantly reduced the payout for damages.

“The litigation tears more people up than the environment in the end,” he said.

Canadian tech company Sandvine grows revenue, stabalizes

Business Assignment
Share

Sandvine Corp., a Waterloo based company that sells technology to Internet service providers, saw its annual revenue grow by 21 per cent this year, from US $88 million to $107 million.

Sandvine sells computer equipment and software which allows service providers to monitor or manage Internet traffic better.

Scott Penner, an analyst at TD Securities, said the big story on Sandvine this year is their revenue.

“They’ve been meeting expectations for a number of quarters in a row now,” he said.

“That’s a big difference versus a couple of years ago when it was kind of a white knuckle ride every quarter.”

Robert Young, an analyst from Canaccord Genuity, said Sandvine faced three major problems over recent years.

It was too complicated for clients to do software upgrades, a company they were working with caused some problems with a client and then two new competitors started beating them in wireless sales.

Young said Sandvine upgraded their software’s graphical interfaces and “spent a heck of a lot in R&D in 2011.”

Then through 2013 they stretched ahead of those competitors.

In the past, Sandvine has been criticized by investors for spending too much.

But now they’re out of their research and development cycle, and “they’re looking pretty good,” Young said.

“Operating expenses sort of went flat at the $17 or $18 million level,” he said.

That’s important because technology investors and analysts pay close attention to operating expenses and revenue.

In a news release the company said this year it picked up 25 new customers and made over $9 million in sales to large and well known service providers.

Net Neutrality ruling could change up the US DPI market

Because Sandvine sells equipment in different countries, sometimes its equipment can’t be used at its full extent because of different regulations on Internet traffic management.

But in the United States, an appeals court recently overturned the Federal Communication Commission’s net neutrality regulations.

So called “net neutrality” restrictions limit the extent ISPs can monitor, block or slow Internet traffic.

Scott Parsons, a postdoctoral fellow at University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab, a research group that focuses on Internet communications technology, says no one is realy certain about the effect of the appeals court ruling yet.

But he adds that vendor companies, like Sandvine, which sells to Comcast in the US, have a chance to boost sales.

“It makes their products potentially far more appealing to telecommunications providers int he United States,” he said.

“Various providers – Sandvine, Cisco, or other DPI based vendors have opportunity to target their market more aggressively.”

The FCC regulations made ISPs treat services like Youtube and Netflix the same way as a similar service their own companies or ones they have contracts with might provide.

What has changed, according to Parsons, is the possibility for ISPs to discriminate in regulating traffic flow depending on ownership.

“If you’re selling a product that’s capable of both identifying different kinds of traffic flows and treating it differently on the network, as a vendor, you have an increased opportunity to dive in that market.”

But Parsons also said it’s not clear if carriers actually would do that because it they would risk customers jumping ship to ISPs that preach neutrality.

On the other hand, because US telecom markets are concentrated, they could all start engaging in it.

“It’s not a brand new market that just opened up,” Parsons said. But it could potentially be a new revenue model.

“Sandvine, Cisco, Huawei — all of them are going to be able to make a much stronger case pitching to businesses they can find more value in what you’re providing because you can start changing customers at a more granular level, or turn around and start charging providers for the content.”