Submission
The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat

ADVISORY SERVICES
Access to Information Review

August 4, 2021

KPMG LLP
150 Elgin Street
Suite 1800
Ottawa, Quebec K2P 1L4

Telephone	613-212-5764
Fax	613-212-2896
Internet	www.kpmg.ca

August 4, 2021

The Honourable Jean-Yves Duclos, P.C., M.P. President of the Treasury Board
90 Elgin Street Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0R5

SUBJECT: The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat - Access to Information Review

Dear Minister Duclos,
KPMG values the opportunity to actively participate in the consultation process led by the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat (TBS) on behalf of the Government of Canada and submit our contribution pertaining to the foundational and crucial review of the Access to Information (ATI) Act.
We strongly support the government’s desire for greater transparency and take seriously the call to engage and contribute to the deliberations on how best to achieve this important objective in the interest of Canadians and other constituents from coast to coast to coast.
KPMG is responding to two areas of the mandate as requested under the TBS’s Terms of Reference for the Access to Information Review.
Specifically:
Opportunities to improve proactive publication to make information openly available, and;
Assessing processes and systems to improve service and reduce delays.
We will not address the review of the legislative framework. We will, however, explore and present a range of diverse yet related access to information elements—such as personal privacy and digital identity that do have legislative implications—in addition to the two areas specified.
Information access and the relationship between the citizenry and the public realm, the latter dedicated to protecting the former’s interests, represents one of the fundamental issues of the day impacting our society.
While we are living through an era of profound transformational change, there remains an unbroken bond between a citizen and its sovereign government with respect to the treatment of information, both for the individual and for the democratic process.
There is nothing more sacred than this important relationship, as articulated by TBS in its mission “to broaden understanding of the Access to Information Act, its important role in our democracy, and the values and principles it balances.”

The ATI Act is a foundational piece of legislation that will directly impact the level of trust and confidence that constituents, sovereign states and global stakeholders have and expect. The decisions we make now will have vast implications for the future of Canada.
We believe that the Access to Information discussion is inherently about the key issues of trust, transparency and governance, and how we as a nation show up in our global context. Consequently, we must, at a minimum, stand with our international peers with whom we share common values, alliances, obligations and agreements.
This review of the ATI Act is both timely and relevant in the current global and Canadian context to encourage open, transparent government. We offer our contributions as we believe they will be useful for this unique venture where we hold a shared belief: the importance of the transparency of information to a democracy, good governance and the rule of law.
As a Canadian firm committed to the prosperity of Canada, we resolve to work For Better to support our public servants and governments at all levels to do what matters for Canadians, never losing sight of the importance of our role in building trust and delivering a stronger future. This is our purpose and our promise. We embrace our obligation as a society to contribute.
We trust that we can offer value in the following pages. Once again, thank you for this opportunity.

Sincerely,

Leigh Harris
Lead Partner, Federal Government Partner, Management Consulting

We live in a new connected world, with the promise that digital transformation holds to shape modern government that is fully agile, responsive and built to put its customers at the centre of everything it does. The widespread health pandemic has given the world— and governments themselves—an unexpected but highly revealing glimpse of what is possible.
Liz Forsythe
Global Government Leader

To achieve citizen-centric transformation, public-sector workforces will need to be supported with the appropriate training and toolsets. Government leaders will have to evolve the culture within and across their government entities by establishing a new outward-looking mindset, providing citizens with the opportunity to co-design government services via their input and feedback.
Michael Klubal
Canadian Government Leader

The challenge for government is to deliver a services model that is
designed from the outside in, putting customers at the centre of a complete digital ecosystem that makes the most of data to unlock timely insights and support evidence-based decision- making.
Leigh Harris
Lead Partner, Federal Government

Context

Information access is one of the key cornerstones of a citizen-focused digital society, a dynamic tool of empowerment allowing citizens to keep government accountable and thus make informed decisions impacting their lives. People are looking to improved, rapid access to information as a way of expressing their collective rights and voice.

Canada has taken giant strides to respond to demands from the public for greater government transparency since the passage of the Access to Information (ATI) Act in 1983. It is one of approximately 100 countries that now has “right to information” laws, giving individuals the opportunity to access information held by different levels of national, provincial and local government departments and agencies, as well as private-sector organizations.
According to the 2021 report, Modernizing Government
- Global Trends: An Era of Public Service that is Agile, Digital and Customer Centric, we point out that the status quo “is now poised to give way to a new model built on digital technology, cloud platforms,
collaboration with other governments, new partnerships with industry, and customer centricity—supported
by new and upskilled civil servants—ultimately revolutionizing how governments function in the 21st-century public interest.” Citizens want more information from their governments and expect to receive it in a timely fashion. Faced with a growing number of requests for information, government

departments have become overwhelmed by the demand – and the backlogs of unanswered information requests are growing.
Canada’s Access to Information Act stipulates that the response must be delivered within 30 calendar days, putting ATI officers under considerable stress. The challenge is not simply the need to meet the
30-day deadline, but also the strain placed on the predominantly manual methods of retrieving information, leading to a lack of consistency in answers to requests.
Each governmental department has many layers of management with different interpretations of the rules, made more complex when several functions are required to provide part of an answer. This makes it almost impossible to complete all the ATI requests received by the government within the deadline. In fact, of the requests received and completed pursuant to the Access to Information Act in 2019-2020, only 50%1 were processed within 30 days or less.

Modernizing Government
- Global Trends: An Era of Public Service that is Agile, Digital and Customer Centric
Source: https://assets.kpmg/ content/dam/kpmg/xx/pdf/2021/04/ modernizing-government-global- trends.pdf

1 Source: https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/trans/atip-aiprp/rep-rap/a2019_20/
index.html#toc31

How we can contribute

Access to information is one of the paramount issues of the day facing citizens, constituents and government.

We value the opportunity to share our thoughts about this critical relationship and important issue, and elevate some of those best practices and learnings that may be conducive, constructive and instructive on this journey.
KPMG does not make it a practice to actively participate in public or policy consultations, as we respect the right and the capabilities of qualified public officials to form and inform such matters. However, in this case and given the value we believe we can offer, we feel it is our obligation to respond to the two areas that are relevant to us: opportunities to improve proactive publication to make it more available, and; assessing processes and systems to improve service and reduce delays.
We will not address the policy or legislative aspects of the ATI Review. But we will reflect upon and make connections to relevant other dimensions, such as privacy, digital government and citizen-centric design, all of which may have legislative implications related to Access to Information now and in the future.

A View Beyond the Horizon
Source: https://corostrandberg.com/wp-content/ uploads/2021/04/societal-megatrends-2021.pdf

For example, in A View Beyond the Horizon, a study examining the 10 societal megatrends commissioned by the Horizontal Policy Unit of the Social Innovation and Community Development

Directorate of Employment and Social Development Canada, we discuss the importance for organizations to consider the risks and impacts (legal, social and ethical) associated with the digital and data economy, including concerns about the pervasiveness of
data-collection and use, relating to data governance, privacy and security.
Citizens and constituents are accessing things digitally at an increasing pace, thereby pushing the issue of privacy more into the spotlight. This would include, for example, democracy and privacy rights. This is happening in an environment where there are many considerations—massive digital thrusts, economic factors, accessibility/privacy/cybersecurity issues, and disinformation—to contemplate. These issues are receiving growing attention in the
media worldwide and, in one way or another, are increasingly relevant to everyone.
With all this in mind, we have taken the liberty of connecting our thinking around these issues directly related to the two questions at hand. Therefore, under Issue #1 (Opportunities to improve proactive publication to make it more available), we will address open government and access. And under Issue #2 (Assessing processes and systems to improve service and reduce delays), we will discuss digital centricity for the citizen as well as digital government.

Issue # 1
Opportunities to improve proactive publication to make it more available

The exponential  growth in the volume and speed of access to information and communication has numerous effects. It can generate new markets
and challenge existing
institutions. Unlike some other trends, there are
no clear indications of enabling technologies shaping the future of
government more so in one region than another.

Citizen Centricity
Citizens living in a digital era expect increased transparency about government decisions, services and data. What this means is that the process must be designed with citizen centricity in mind. It is not just about making information more available; it is also about how that information can be efficiently accessed.
Now is the time to start thinking about a privacy framework that can be used to codify and configure a technical solution. To offer a truly good service and a citizen-centric experience, digital solutions are a factor in advancing that process.

Privacy
The concept of privacy is another consideration. Canada’s Privacy Act came into force in 1983, when information was still mainly stored on paper. There has been a dramatic change in society and technological advances since then. The federal government is pushing forward amendments to modernize the Privacy Act, along with other federal and provincial changes – the government’s efforts for regulatory privacy reform have been well underway.
The Parliamentary Committee report of the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics on PIPEDA reform identified 19 recommendations for privacy change, including: better consent, transparency, order-making powers, data portability, algorithmic transparency, and the adoption of Privacy by Design, inspired by many of the provisions found in the European Union’s (EU) General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

In May of 2019, Navdeep Bains—Canada’s then Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry— launched Canada’s first-ever Digital Charter, which outlined high-level principles to measure the modernization of our privacy laws, competition rules and all government programs, namely via PIPEDA, the Privacy Act, Competition Act and Statistics Act. This was predicated on national digital consultations hosted by Minister Bains during the summer of
2019 for Strengthening Privacy for the Digital Age, where KPMG participated in roundtable discussions to address the need for a harmonized yet pragmatic approach to modernizing Canada’s privacy regime to maintain adequacy with the GDPR.
While we anticipate that Bill C-11 at the federal private-sector level will adopt a balanced approach to data protection  that  promotes  innovation, fosters growth and keeps pace with our EU and US counterparts, we expect significant changes based on three major themes. These, in turn, will shape regulatory expectations in the public sector to promote:
Greater consumer choice, control and respect for Canadians’ personal data;
Responsible data innovation, which involves industry-led standards and data trusts; and
Stronger enforceable protections.

With Bill 64 pending in Quebec and the ongoing consultations in Ontario and British Columbia calling for regulatory change in the private sector, it is imperative that our Canadian regulatory reform be harmonized and interoperable with other privacy frameworks in the public sector to enable Canadian companies and all organizations to streamline their compliance efforts.

Digital Identity
Confirming a person’s identity—digital or otherwise— can be critical. Before a Privacy request can be processed, the requestor’s identity must first be confirmed to a sufficient degree of assurance before any sort of sensitive information can be released.
Currently, this process is cumbersome and often

handled with scans of analog documents, such as passports or driver’s licenses, which are then verified manually on the other end to confirm authenticity before the Privacy request can be processed.
There are a number or risks associated with this approach, ranging from potential identification errors due to poor scan quality, as well as the cybersecurity risks that come with storing this additional data that is now being collected and stored.
The solution to this challenge is the adoption of a trusted digital identity, one that can prove that the requestor is in fact who they claim to be. Not only would this eliminate the need for the government to collect scans of analog identity documents, it would also enable a more seamless user experience from point of entry.
Citizens would be able to leverage an approved digital identity of their choosing to instantly validate themselves and proceed immediately to submitting the request. This would also align with the federal government’s digital identity end state vision, which calls for an interoperable identity ecosystem governed by the Pan-Canadian Trust
Framework across all jurisdictions. It would align, as well, to Priority 2.3—Build and use secure common solutions for digital service delivery—of the Canadian Government’s Digital Operations Strategic Plan: 2021- 2024.

Open Government
In a rapid-paced world of sweeping changes, governments are confronting a plethora of critical issues that are impacting their citizens. Whether on the global, national or local stage, open data is a key driver of constructive outcomes for society as a whole. And when technology and data converge,
transformational benefits occur. Add in, as well, the emergence of artificial intelligence and other leading- edge technologies that are altering and accelerating the development of data-rich economies.
The theory behind a lot of the push for Open Data was that it would reduce the number of ATI requests because the data was already in the open. Similarly, if it were a legitimate ATI request and it already

went through the process of internal redactions and such, the government would want to post it publicly to prevent all the duplicate requests for the same information. So, a three-pronged approach towards efficiency is needed:
First, publish as much open data as possible so that people do not have to submit ATI requests to get it;
Second, when ATI requests are submitted, the process needs to be very smooth and efficient so that it is delivered quickly, and;
Third, when one ATI request is answered, those results are published for all to see so that no Canadian needs to ask for the same information twice.

ATIP Capability Evolution
There are some significant issues around how this
type of practice challenges existing institutions. Outdated information discovery governance, techniques, and tools within Government Departments and Agencies is at the heart of the challenges to the evolution of a modern digital access to information capability.
Information discovery includes the repeatable and auditable activities and processes required to extract pertinent information and data across numerous business sources to answer questions. Without such a capability, modern enabling access to information technologies cannot be properly acquired and deployed.
A modern information discovery operating model is not only imperative to a rejuvenated ATIP approach, but also foundational to the digital evolution of public service, government operations, and modern expectations for accountability.

In the context of opportunities to improve proactive publication to make it more available, we recommend:

Aligning and enacting open government, privacy and digital identity legislation and policies

Accelerating digital identity for  constituents to enable citizen-centricity

Designing a consistent information discovery operating model that will be fit for purpose
to result in the necessary outcomes

Issue # 2
Assessing processes and systems to improve service and reduce delays

Technological innovation
has changed the paradigm for government: faster
and more cost-effective systems and processes deliver greater levels of
agility and responsiveness to service providers. At
the same time, increased access to information has resulted in better informed and more engaged
citizens.

Identifying and deploying the right technologies to support the delivery of government services is a key challenge for the public sector. It will need to not only respond to new innovations, but also meet the growing demands from stakeholders who increasingly expect to be able to access government services using new technologies.

Lessons Learned
The COVID-19 pandemic has unexpectedly revealed what is possible, and forward-looking governments are now wisely leveraging their momentum to seize a “golden opportunity” for historic innovation. In our view, the future of government—agile, responsive, citizen centric and more closely aligned to the needs of business—has arrived.1
Ultimately, citizen centricity is about solutions designed to save people time and money, and deliver enhanced value and trust in their
interactions with the public sector. To do so, government needs to rapidly embrace and scale the agile developments and advancements as a new capability core to public-service delivery.
In addressing this challenge, the application of a government-wide modern information discovery operating model—that is digitally designed, powered and connected—is required. This is not only imperative to a modern fit-for-purpose ATIP approach, it is foundational to the digital revolution of public service, government operations and modern expectations for accountability brought about by the fourth industrial revolution.

1 Source: https://assets.kpmg/content/dam/kpmg/uk/pdf/2021/06/modernising-government-global- trends-final.pdf

Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Technologies
Artificial intelligence and cognitive technologies such as intelligent automation can enable an efficient
and effective operating model that is connected, integrated, rigorous and consistent.
As profiled in our 2021 publication, Trends in Artificial Intelligence1, we use a multidisciplinary approach that essentially fast-tracks connections between a business’s technology experts, its users and the specific AI tools needed to solve problems and enhance processes. Our modular architecture effectively collapses the traditional timelines and costs needed to complete business processes and generate informed decisions.
This approach sets the conditions for successful machine learning, so that the knowledge gained from each search will be additive. In addition, ATIP officers will no longer have to start from scratch with each request for information, reinventing the wheel each time.
Each information request will lead to incremental improvements in the retrieval process. As the system improves and ATIP officers learn how to interact
with the solution, information requests will become more automated, leaving officers to focus on the more intellectually high-value parts of each task.
Psychological stress will decline, and job satisfaction will increase. Compliance with the legal requirement for access to information will become sustainable, not an increasingly painful exercise.
Over time, the demand for information from governments and other organizations, both public and private, is only going to rise. Officials who are required to provide the information will benefit from a complete, integrated solution that helps them retrieve it in a timely and efficient fashion. The task requires a powerful search engine and a methodical business “brain” that can discover the data in a manner that is timely, consistent, repeatable and reliable.
Artificial intelligence, on its own, is not a panacea. It
is a tool upon which a curriculum is built. The search

and capture techniques must be created but will automatically improve, becoming more and more efficient.
The information discovery operating model solution is not to replace humans, but better provides public officials and administrators with the technology that will enable them to do their jobs better. This will
not only make information access more efficient and rigorous; it will ultimately help build trust and strengthen public confidence in the transparency of government.
However, designing this process with citizen and constituent centricity in mind must be in line with digital government ambitions as regards the
responsible adoption of intelligent automation and
artificial intelligence tools.
It is essential that matters related to ethical and application considerations must be dealt with in legislation. Examining the use of these readily available intelligent automation and artificial intelligence tools now is essential to accomplishing just that.

This will not  only  make  information  access more efficient and rigorous; it will ultimately help build trust  and  strengthen  public confidence in the transparency of government.

Cyber and Data Protection
Today’s new reality and threat landscape requires cyber and data protection to move beyond traditional approaches to effectively manage security and protect vital information assets. For example, cloud-enabled technology is playing a crucial role in governments’ efforts to transform  public-sector  infrastructure  in ways that can provide new citizen-centric services and operational efficiencies.
Cloud adoption can present vast opportunities to help deliver reliable new public-facing services while considerably enhancing data use and decision

1 Source: https://home.kpmg/jp/en/home/insights/2021/02/trends-in- artificial-intelligence.html

making, cost efficiency, workforce productivity, scalability and more. But working in the cloud is not likely to relieve government organizations of

Securing the cloud — the next chapter in public services
Source: https://assets.kpmg/ content/dam/kpmg/xx/pdf/2021/06/ securing-the-cloud-next-chapter. pdf

data privacy as well as security concerns and needs. As technology and cloud solutions become more sophisticated, so can the efforts of hackers endlessly crafting creative new ways to access sensitive data.

People need to have confidence in the way that data is being shared and how it is being used. And, with a rapidly evolving threat environment, government organizations must prioritize the protection of the data to ensure that trust is upheld. This implies
a holistic approach to cyber security and data protection, starting with building solutions with a “security-by-design” mindset, but also ensuring appropriate detection and response measures are implemented on top of that, enabling a quick
mitigation and recovery if a cyber incident were to occur.

In the context of assessing processes and systems to improve service and reduce delays, we recommend:

Embracing and exploiting leading-edge AI and AI tools and techniques as part of the operating model

Protecting the  data  and the  systems  through policy measures and cyber techniques

Designing the entire experience around the constituents and citizens with explicit journey maps and pathways that will truly be service experience focused, updating/communicating/ delivering a service promise with service levels that meet or exceed expectations

Conclusion

We truly value this opportunity to contribute to the review of the Access to Information Act. As a dedicated and committed business advisor and partner
to the Canadian federal government on many significant national imperatives and initiatives, KPMG remains attentive and engaged on matters of importance to Canada.

We welcome a call to action to support our country, citizens and constituents where we may offer value.

Let’s Do This.

Diverse perspectives make a world of difference.

Let’s do this.

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