Mediacheck

Perils of BC's New Freedom of Info Policy

Revised FOI approach may look good on surface, but dig deeper and it's bad news.

By Sean Holman, 31 Aug 2011, J-Source

Confidential notes

Government secrets: media now has less incentive to chase after them.

Text size:

Rate this:

Login/Register

Related

British Columbians may soon know a lot less about what's happening in the government's backrooms, thanks to a recent change in how it responds to freedom of information requests.
 


In the past, those records -- which have revealed everything from secret contracts awarded to the premier's supporters, to which ministry has the worst performing bureaucrats -- have only been given to the individuals who asked for them.

But now those records are being posted online for everyone to see -- three business days after they're given to the applicant, on or after 8 p.m.
 


Premier Christy Clark's administration claims that change will make her government more accessible.

In practice, however, I believe it will dampen the incentive for journalists to file freedom of information requests.

Killing media's incentive

While most of us in the media are civic-minded folks, we don't go on the hunt for internal government records solely to serve the public interest. We do so to obtain exclusive access to information our competitors don't have.

The resulting scoop is our reward for the time it takes to research and write those requests. But, for reporters at weekly or monthly news outlets, the government's new freedom of information release policy gives faster competitors a chance to steal that reward.

For example, Vancouver's the Georgia Straight has a 1 p.m. Wednesday deadline for news items appearing in its Thursday paper. That means the dailies could have first crack at printing information from freedom of information responses the Straight receives later that same day or on Thursday. And the dailies will have a chance to match the weekly's coverage in the case of responses received on Friday.

The Straight could publish such stories on its website to make sure it beats the competition. But most weeklies have an Internet viewership that's smaller than their print readership. And, in any case, their business models are still based on selling ads in print, not online.

So why assign newsroom resources -- including footing the occasional fees associated with freedom of information requests -- to work that, quite literally, might not pay off or might benefit a competitor?

Too fast for safety

Weekly and monthly news outlets aren't the only ones disadvantaged by this policy change. Journalists at faster outlets now have a limited amount of time to read through and report on what can amount to hundreds of pages of information before their competitors can access them.

Sometimes it will be impossible to meet that deadline, or even legally hazardous in the case of stories that could damage someone's reputation. And what happens if we receive a response while we're on vacation?

This should be a concern for both journalists and members of the public.

After all, it's members of the media who are usually the most effective filers of public interest freedom of information requests, exposing government wrongdoing in the process. And if we're discouraged from doing that work, there are few others in society who have the inclination, resources or expertise to replace us.

Below the radar

Disturbingly, there's been little public reaction from journalists to this decision. In part, I think that's because many members of the media don't file those requests anymore, having been frustrated by the government's record of slow and heavily censored responses.

Others may recognize the problem this new policy creates but are concerned the public will see the airing of those concerns as media whining. And then there are those who think it would inappropriate for reporters to express their opinions on this or any other government policy -- even if it directly affects them.

But this issue could also directly affect the public, impairing their ability to find out everything the government doesn't want them to find out.

Reporters should be demanding the government wait a minimum of one week before publicly posting freedom of information request responses, with an opportunity to ask for an extension.

If we don't, the readers and viewers we're supposed to be serving won't know what they're missing. [Tyee]

Sean Holman wrote this for J-Source, where it first appeared. Holman teaches journalism at the University of Victoria. He's also a syndicated columnist, talk show host and the editor of Public Eye, a prominent online journal covering provincial politics. In fiscal 2009/10, he was responsible for 24 per cent of the 446 freedom of information requests filed by the media. Find his other Tyee stories here.

10 Comments:

Login or register to post comments

  • BC Blue

    38 weeks ago

    Commend Holman but...

    The BC media isn't very good at "demanding" anything that harms the Liberals.

    Will journos from Black Press whose owner is an open supporter of the Liberals demand accountability?

    Will CTV which spikes embarrassing Liberal stories & whose alumni fill Christy's office demand it?

    Will CKNW with Bill Good running cover for Christy do any of this "demanding"?

    The list gets very short very fast...

  • metacomet

    38 weeks ago

    Don't be sad

    Don't be sad, Sean, we still need you journalists to put FOI stuff into context because some of it is, by design, incredibly byzantine. The scoop that's still available is the astute analysis of complex info and the gleaning of those diamonds in the rough.

  • motorcycleguy

    38 weeks ago

    out of context...but

    "little public reaction from journalists" .....I'll say....darn near no reaction from journalists... on anything!....they may well be "the most effective filers of public interest freedom of information requests" but they sure aren't "exposing government wrongdoing" ...present company excepted

  • OwlRol

    38 weeks ago

    One week FOI delay is not unreasonable

    A week's delay does not seem unreasonable, many of the issues embedded in the documents linger for months and years.

    Such a delay could also avoid some media errors as they try to "scoop" the competition.

    But metacomet is correct, its not who gets the information first (as sexy as some consider this), but who can put the various pieces of information together with "astute analysis" to give us a meaningful story to chew on.

  • igbymac

    38 weeks ago

    where is I.F. Stone??

    So many of our statutes and regulations are exactly opposite of what their tag suggests: for example, here Freedom of Information only means you are free to ask for the Information, and they are free to release only what they want. Or another example is the Worker's Compensation Act, where the largest contributors are the employers and, accordingly, the Act provides them protection from Workers seeking compensation for negligence or from pursuing typical tort claims - it really is just Employer Insurance partially funded by the labour pool.

  • Bruno96

    38 weeks ago

    Damned Straight

    My sentiments exactly, motorcycleguy.

    What passes for mainstream journalism nowadays would surely have Edward R. Murrow spinning in his grave.

  • Blindsite

    38 weeks ago

    What about citizen journalism?

    This may not be good for mainstream, for profit, journalism but it could be great for citizen journalists who aren't working for a news agency and are just doing the research and trying to get the story out.

  • elbillug

    38 weeks ago

    again?

    Another one barking up this tree ? You clearly didn't do your 'research' before writing this article. Stanley Tromp already (unsuccessfully) tried to convince us that the media is so special right here on the Tyee in March:
    http://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2011/03/03/DavidHahnFOI/
    http://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2011/03/04/AmendFOIStrategy/

    Please. You can go through the posts on those articles to get the 'scoop' but I will summarize here:
    - nobody trusts the 'media' to be the guardians of our information. We want to access it ourselves.
    - If you go to BC Ferries FOI website, you'll see that the majority of request are *not* from the media, but from individuals. And I'm sure the majority of those individuals would prefer to have their requests open to the public asap.

    How many self-serving articles will we see on this topic ? Enough already !

  • ChrisB

    38 weeks ago

    The Real FOI Story

    Does this new policy really constitute a serious disincentive to journalists?

    I'm not convinced it does but would agree that a week or two would be a more appropriate timeline.

    If Mr. Holman wants a scoop he can take a look at the order issued by the OIPC in February 2010 - http://www.oipc.bc.ca/orders/2010/OrderF10-04.pdf - denying me access to an archive of documents on the basis of "solicitor-client privilege" and then consider the implications of my request and the denial. Is there any journalist that understands the significance of "solicitor-client privilege", particularly when it's used to protect lawyers who are on the public payroll?

    The government and the legal establishment are no doubt grateful that no journalist is up to the challenge of asking the questions this issue demands.

  • Jeffrey J.

    38 weeks ago

    Kudos to Sean Holman

    Mr. Holman is one of a select few real journalists in BC (along with the Tyee, David Beers, Andrew Nikiforuk, Rafe Maeir, Bob Macklin, Bill Tieleman, Damien Gillis).

    He has tireless published on a daily basis at Public Eye Online:

    http://www.publiceyeonline.com/

    When Holman sounds an alarm, it's serious. He was the first to warn about organized crime infiltrating BC casinos. The story finally got legs after being picked up by the corporate media. But Sean had been writing about this for a year or two before.

    The concern about FOI process is BC has also been discussed by PublicEyeOnline for a year to so. This policy is a deliberate undermining of a process that worked.

    How do we know it worked? Because the government hates it and wants to change it. If they want to change it, you know it was good. This authoritarian regime cares not a whit for the public good.

    Kudos to Sean Holman and Tyee yet again.

    • The discussion for this story is closed. No more comments can be added.