2020 to 2021 Annual Report on the Access to Information Act

On this page

• Introduction
• Purpose of the Access to Information Act
• Mandate of the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat
• Delegation order
• Organizational structure
• Performance in 2020–21
• Requests received and carried forward
• Requests completed and pages processed
• Disposition of requests and exemptions and exclusions applied to records
• On-time compliance rate, completion times and extensions
• Sources of requests
• Format of information released
• Informal requests
• Consultations
• Impact of COVID‑19 pandemic on ATIP office operations
• Training and awareness
• Policies, guidelines, procedures and initiatives
• Complaints and audits
• Monitoring compliance
• Fees and costs
• Appendix A: Statistical Report on the Access to Information Act
• Appendix B: Supplemental Statistical Report on the Access to Information Act and Privacy Act
• Appendix C: Delegation Order

Introduction

The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat (TBS) is pleased to present to Parliament its annual report on the administration of the Access to Information Act for fiscal year 2020–21 (April 1, 2020, to March 31, 2021).

This report is prepared and tabled in accordance with the following:

• section 94 of the Access to Information Act, which requires that the head of every federal institution prepare and submit an annual report to Parliament on the administration of the act in the institution during the fiscal year
• section 20 of the Service Fees Act, which requires that a responsible authority report annually to Parliament on the fees collected by institutions

Purpose of the Access to Information Act

The purpose of the Access to Information Act is to enhance the accountability and transparency of federal institutions in order to promote an open and democratic society and to enable public debate on the conduct of those institutions. In furtherance of that purpose:

• Part 1 extends the present laws of Canada to provide a right of access to information in records under the control of a government institution in accordance with the principles that government information should be available to the public, that necessary exceptions to the right of access should be limited and specific, and that decisions on the disclosure of government information should be reviewed independently of government
• Part 2 sets out requirements for the proactive publication of information

Mandate of the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat

As the administrative arm of the Treasury Board, TBS has a dual mandate: to support the Treasury Board as a committee of ministers and to fulfill the statutory responsibilities of a central government agency. The Treasury Board’s mandate is derived from the Financial Administration Act.

To fulfill its mandate, TBS organizes its business and resources around four core responsibilities:

• spending oversight
• administrative leadership
• employer
• regulatory oversight

TBS provides advice and support to Treasury Board ministers in their role of ensuring value for money. It also provides oversight of the financial management functions in departments and agencies.

TBS makes recommendations and provides advice to the Treasury Board on policies, directives, regulations, and program expenditure proposals with respect to the management of the government’s resources. Its responsibilities for the general management of the government affect initiatives, issues and activities that cut across all policy sectors managed by federal departments and organizational entities (as reported in the Main Estimates). TBS is also responsible for the comptrollership function of government.

The offices of the following government officials are part of TBS:

• the Comptroller General of Canada
• the Chief Human Resources Officer of Canada
• the Chief Information Officer of Canada

The Comptroller General provides government-wide leadership, direction, oversight and capacity‑building for financial management, internal audit and the management of assets and acquired services.

The Chief Human Resources Officer provides government-wide leadership on people management through policies, programs and strategic engagement, and by centrally managing labour relations, compensation, pensions and benefits, and contributing to the management of executives.

The Chief Information Officer provides government-wide leadership, direction, oversight and capacity‑building for information management, information technology, government security (including identity management), access to information, privacy, and internal and external service delivery.

Delegation order

Pursuant to subsection 95(1) of the Access to Information Act, the President of the Treasury Board has delegated the powers, duties and functions for the administration of the Access to Information Act to the following TBS officials: the Secretary of the Treasury Board, the Assistant Secretary of Strategic Communications and Ministerial Affairs, the Senior Director of Ministerial Services, the Director of Access to Information and Privacy and managers of Access to Information and Privacy (sections 19 and 23). Certain administrative functions are also delegated to managers, team leaders and officers to accelerate the processing of requests.

The delegation order was signed on December 13, 2019, and a copy can be found in Appendix C.

Organizational structure

The Access to Information and Privacy (ATIP) office is part of the Ministerial Services Division of TBS’s Strategic Communications and Ministerial Affairs Sector.

The ATIP office is responsible for implementing and managing programs and services relating to TBS’s administration of the Access to Information Act and the Privacy Act, as well as for providing advice to TBS employees as they fulfill their obligations under both acts.

The ATIP office is led by a director, who is supported by 3 managers. Each of these managers oversees a unit that is responsible for a different functional area:

• Intake and Governance Unit
• Operations Unit
• Privacy Policy Unit

The Intake and Governance Unit and the Operations Unit work together closely to process ATIP requests.

The Privacy Policy Unit supports sector officials on privacy‑related matters.

In total, 22 full‑time employees at various levels administered the acts in 2020–21, with the support of 3 part-time university students.

The most significant changes in the ATIP office this year were a change in director in September 2021 and the official transfer to the office of certain responsibilities for proactive publication of information.

Figure 1 shows the roles of the individuals and teams involved in processing ATIP requests at TBS. The ATIP office has 3 functional units. Sector liaison officers, although not part of the ATIP office, also play an important role in processing requests because they coordinate ATIP activities in their sector.

Figure 1 - Text version

The ATIP Director is supported by three units: the ATIP Intake and Governance Unit, the ATIP Operations Unit and the Privacy Policy Unit.

The ATIP Intake and Governance Unit coordinates and reviews documents for proactive disclosure and receives ATIP requests from the public and consultation requests from other departments. The unit also liaises with sectors to obtain and retrieve documents needed to process ATIP requests, and prepares reports on performance, using data in the ATIP software. The unit is comprised of 7 employees and 1 student.

The ATIP Operations Unit reviews documents to be sent in response to requests made under the Access to Information Act and Privacy Act and consults any required parties. The unit liaises with the Office of Information Commissioner and the Office of the Privacy Commissioner to resolve complaints and reviews records for parliamentary Motions for the Production of Papers. The Operations Unit is comprised of 9 employees.

The Privacy Policy Unit advises and supports TBS officials to ensure compliance with the Privacy Act and related policy instruments. The unit also supports TBS officials to ensure that individuals’ privacy rights are respected in the delivery of programs and activities. Lastly, the unit supports the ATIP Director in their role as delegate responsible for section 10 of the Privacy Act. The Privacy Policy Unit is comprised of 5 employees.

As aforementioned, the ATIP sector liaison officers are not part of the ATIP office. They support the ATIP program by coordinating ATIP activities in their sector.

Section 96 of the Access to Information Act allows government institutions to provide services related to access to information to another government institution that is presided over by the same minister. In 2020–21, the ATIP office did not provide any such services.

Performance in 2020–21

Statistical reports prepared by government institutions provide aggregate data on the application of the Access to Information Act and Privacy Act legislation. This information is made public annually in a Statistical Report that is included with the annual reports on access to information and privacy tabled in Parliament by each institution. TBS’s statistical report on the Access to Information Act for 2020–21 is in Appendix A .

This year, institutions were asked to report on how the COVID‑19 pandemic affected their capacity to receive requests and process records. The 2020–21 Supplemental Statistical Report on the Access to Information Act and Privacy Act is in Appendix B .

The following sections contain highlights on TBS’s performance in 2020–21 in relation to its obligations under the Access to Information Act and analyses of the notable statistical data for this year compared with previous years.

Requests received and carried forward

In 2020–21, TBS received a total of 328 new requests under the Access to Information Act. This represents a 14% decrease from the 2019–20 total of 380.

The number of requests carried forward increased from 154 in 2019–20 to 165 in 2020–21. This increase was a direct result of the COVID‑19 pandemic.

Figure 2 shows how many access to information requests TBS received each year and how many were carried forward for 2017–18 to 2020–21.

Figure 2 - Text version

Fiscal year	Requests received	Requests carried forward
2017–18	574	150
2018–19	564	196
2019–20	380	154
2020–21	328	165

Requests completed and pages processed

TBS completed 317 requests in 2020–21, which represents 65,675 pages processed. With the removal of an outlier of 15 million pages reported last year, more pages were processed this year than in both of the last two fiscal years, even though requests completed decreased by 25% from last year to this year. This year, 60 of the 317 completed requests involved the processing of more than 100 pages.

Figure 3 shows, for 2017–18 to 2020–21, the number of access to information requests TBS completed each year and the number of pages it processed for those requests. The number of requests completed has been decreasing since 2017–18, but the number of pages processed for them increased from 2019–20 to 2020–21.

Figure 3 - Text version

Fiscal year	Requests completed	Pages processed
2017–18	557	75,958
2018–19	518	46,241
2019–20figure 3 note *	420	39,174
2020–21	317	65,676
Figure 2 Notes Figure 3 Note 1 Outlier of 1.5 million pages removed Return to figure 3 note * referrer

As shown in Figure 4, the average number of pages processed for each completed request increased drastically from 2019–20 to 2020–21.

Figure 4 - Text version

Fiscal year	Average number of pages processed per completed request
2017–18	136
2018–19	89
2019–20	93
2020–21	207

Disposition of requests and exemptions and exclusions applied to records

In 2020–21, there were 20 requests that were abandoned by the applicant and 56 requests for which TBS had no records.

For the requests where records were provided, for 65 of them, the records were fully disclosed to the requester without redactions; for 174 of them, the records were partially disclosed; and for 2 of them, the records were fully excluded.

Figure 5 shows the breakdown of requests by disposition for 2020–21.

Figure 5 - Text version

Disposition of requests	Number of requests
Disclosed in part (55%)	174
All disclosed (21%)	65
No records exist (18%)	56
Request abandoned by applicant (6%)	20
All excluded (1%)	2
All exempted (0%)	0
Request transferred (0%)	0
Neither confirmed nor denied (0%)	0
Declined to act (0%)	0

Of the requests that fell within TBS’s mandate, for a significant proportion of them, the records were only partially disclosed because of the nature of TBS’s business, which involves many Cabinet confidences and sensitive advice and recommendations to the President of the Treasury Board and to the Minister of Digital Government.

The Access to Information Act exempts certain information from being disclosed. In 2020–21, 421 records were subject to exemptions under the act and were therefore not disclosed. The majority of them (371) were exempted because the records requested contained the following:

• information related to the internal decision‑making processes of government (162) (section 21 of the act)
• third-party business information (94) (section 20 of the act)
• personal information (83) (section 19 of the act)
• law enforcement and security information (32) (section 16 of the act)

The Access to Information Act does not apply to or excludes Cabinet confidences and confidences of the Privy Council. Many TBS documents are classified as Cabinet or Privy Council confidences because TBS provides administrative support to the Treasury Board, which is a Cabinet committee. Records that are publicly available (for example, government publications and records in libraries or museums) are also excluded.

In 2020–21, a total of 115 records requested were subject to exclusions:

• 114 contained confidences of the Privy Council (section 69 of the act)
• 1 could be found in the public domain (subsection 68(a) of the act)

Every year, the ATIP office receives enquiries from the general public about how to obtain information under the Access to Information Act or the Privacy Act, and about where to send their requests. TBS redirects many of these enquiries to other federal government institutions, and occasionally, to provincial Freedom of Information and Privacy offices. They are not counted as requests for the purposes of this report.

On-time compliance rate, completion times and extensions

Extensions

The legislation sets timelines for responding to access to information requests and allows for extensions in the following cases: when complying with the timeline would result in interference with operations, when a consultation with other institutions is required, or when a third-party consultation is required.

In 2020–21, TBS sought extensions in 262 instances (83%) mainly to consult with other government institutions, legal services, or third parties, but in some cases because complying with the original time limit would have unreasonably interfered with operations. Each file could qualify for multiple extensions.

Figure 6 shows the impact of the increasing average number of pages processed for completed requests on the on‑time compliance rate and on the percentage of completed requests that require an extension.

Figure 6 - Text version

Fiscal year	Average pages processed per completed request	Percentage of requests completed that required an extension	Percentage of requests completed within legislated timelines (on-time compliance rate)
2017–18	136	56%	93%
2018–19	89	70%	97%
2019–20	93	74%	91%
2020–21	207	83%	81%

Figure 7 shows the distribution of the different types of extensions.

Figure 7 - Text version

Extensions	Nubmer
Consultation (paragraph 9(1)(b) of the act)	126
Interference with operations (paragraph 9(1)(a) of the act)	85
Third-party notice (paragraph 9(1)(c) of the act)	51

Completion times

Of the 317 requests closed this year, 35% were closed within 30 days: a slight increase from last year’s rate of 31%. TBS received several requests that did not require consultation with other federal institutions and was therefore able to address these requests either within 15 days of receipt or within 30 days of receipt.

The increase in the number of pages in many requests this year resulted in the need to take legislative extensions. Many requests were therefore closed after the initial 30 days. Requests that took over one year to close increased from 2.8% last fiscal year to 6.6% this fiscal year. This increase is a direct result of the focus on closing requests that were carried over from previous years.

Figure 8 shows the number of requests completed within each completion time.

Figure 8 - Text version

1 to 15 days	16 to 30 days	31 to 60 days	61 to 120 days	121 to 180 days	181 to 365 days	More than 365 days
28	85	40	72	42	29	21

Sources of requests

Of the 328 requests received in 2020–21, most came from the public (130) and the media (82). The two most frequent sources are the same as last year, but this year, the public submitted more requests than the media. The remaining requests were submitted by businesses (30), academia (29), organizations (5) and individuals who declined to identify themselves (52).

Figure 9 shows the distribution of requests received from each source type.

Figure 9 - Text version

Source	Number of requests
Public	130
Media	82
Declined to identify	52
Business (private sector)	30
Academia	29
Organization	5

Format of information released

The ATIP office has continued to strive to increase the number of responses it provides in electronic format. In 2020–21, it released information in electronic format for 239 cases. It provided no paper responses this year, mainly because of the changes made to procedures in order to maintain operations during the COVID‑19 pandemic and to adapt to the new digital environment.

Informal requests

As part of fulfilling its objective of providing Canadians with relevant information on an informal and timely basis, and in the spirit of transparency and open government, TBS processes informal requests for information. These requests are not subject to the Access to Information Act. In 2020–21, the ATIP office responded to 63 informal requests totalling 5,051 pages.

Consultations

TBS receives consultation requests from other federal institutions relating to Access to Information requests involving TBS records or issues. In 2020–21, TBS received 148 consultation requests, down from 381 the previous year. This year’s requests represent a total of 4,849 pages of information, down from 12,042 pages last year.

The 61% decrease in the number of consultation requests in 2020–21 is likely a result of the COVID‑19 pandemic. The volume of these requests is expected to return to pre‑pandemic levels next year.

Impact of COVID‑19 pandemic on ATIP office operations

In response to the measures implemented to minimize the effects of the COVID‑19 pandemic (for example, having all employees work from home), TBS activated its business continuity plan (BCP) on March 16, 2020. Under the BCP, employees providing critical services were given priority for using the limited network capacity. Employees providing non-critical services, were given only limited access to TBS’s virtual private network (VPN).

From March 20, 2020, to June 1, 2020, legislated ATIP services were provided primarily by the handful of employees who were identified as providing critical services and who therefore had VPN access. The remaining employees were granted VPN access on a rotational basis, under the BCP. By June 1, 2020, all TBS ATIP employees had full access to the VPN, and normal ATIP activities resumed. Since then, some staff have also been going to the office regularly to perform certain tasks needed to ensure program continuity (for example, to pick up regular mail and to process paper documents).

The TBS ATIP office had to update its procedures to reflect the realities of a new digital environment while at the same time continuing its operations despite the challenges of the pandemic. It modernized its processes to ensure that requests were processed efficiently and within legislative deadlines to the extent possible.

The TBS ATIP office engaged with both internal and external stakeholders to ensure continued program delivery. It informed sector officials of new procedures and best practices for processing ATIP records remotely. It also provided privacy advice and guidance to program officials to support the development of critical initiatives directly related to the COVID‑19 pandemic. In addition, it provided privacy advice and guidance to internal services partners at TBS to help speed up the deployment of various technologies and tools in support of remote work during the pandemic.

The office informed requesters of potential processing delays and offered them different options in an effort to provide records within legislative timelines and in compliance with the COVID‑19 ATIP Implementation notice issued by TBS’s Information and Privacy Policy Division.

Training and awareness

In 2020–21, the ATIP office continued to expand its outreach activities and provided several training sessions to TBS employees. In all, 41 separate sessions on access and privacy legislation as they relate to ATIP requests were provided to 266 employees. Some of these sessions were tailored to the needs of specific teams and sectors. The office also provided guidance on privacy protection and developed a privacy training video.

In addition, to mark Data Privacy Day, the ATIP office promoted the importance of sound privacy management practices and the shared responsibility for safeguarding personal information in day-to-day activities. The ATIP office published a TBS In-Brief message, in collaboration with colleagues in the Office of the Chief Information Officer. This message also announced the office’s bilingual privacy training presentation.

Policies, guidelines, procedures and initiatives

Complaints and audits

Monitoring compliance

The ATIP Office produces a variety of regular and ad hoc reports to monitor TBS’s compliance with the Access to Information Act and Privacy Act. In 2020–21, a new monthly ATIP dashboard was introduced. It provides a snapshot of statistics, including sector performance trends.

The dashboard is in addition to the regular compliance data that is shared with program areas and senior management weekly.

Fees and costs

Appendix A: Statistical Report on the Access to Information Act

Name of institution: Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat

Reporting period: 2020-04-01 to 2021-03-31

Appendix B: Supplemental Statistical Report on the Access to Information Act and Privacy Act

In addition to completing the forms for the statistical reports on the Access to Information Act and the Privacy Act for 2020 to 2021, institutions were asked to complete this supplemental report regarding capacity to receive requests and capacity to process records.

Name of institution: Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat

Reporting period: 2020-04-01 to 2021-03-31

Appendix C: Delegation Order

I, undersigned, President of the Treasury Board, pursuant to section 95 of the Access to Information Act, hereby designate the ATIP advisors, the Access to Information and Privacy Team Leader, the Access to Information and Privacy Manager, the Access to Information and Privacy Director, the Senior Director of Ministerial Services, the Assistant Secretary, Strategic Communications and Ministerial Affairs, and the Secretary, or persons occupying those positions on an acting basis, to exercise signing authorities or perform any of the President’s powers, duties or functions as head of institution that are specified in the attached Schedule A. This designation replaces all previous delegation orders.

Original signed by

The Honourable Jean-Yves Duclos
President of the Treasury Board
Date: 2019-12-13

© Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada, represented by the President of the Treasury Board, 2021,
ISSN: 2371-2910