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Report 29 - Access to Information Review Task Force
NEW REPORTING FRAMEWORK FOR ASSESSING THE PERFORMANCE OF THE ACCESS TO INFORMATION PROGRAM
Published: April 2002
Goss Gilroy Inc., Management Consultants
Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction
1.1 Background and Purpose of the Study
1.2 Scope & Methodology of the Study
2.0 Assessing Performance Under Access to Information
2.1 The Access to Information Act
2.2 The Access to Information Program
2.3 Performance Models
2.4 ATI Program Performance Model
2.5 Logic Chart
2.6 Performance Data Suggested by
the Model
3.0 Study Findings - Current
Measures of Performance
3.1 The ATI Processes
3.2 Measurements of Performance
3.3 Strengths and Weaknesses
of Data Collected
4.0 ATI Performance Reporting
and Suggested Improvements
4.1 Current Reporting
4.2 Gaps & Deficiencies
in Reporting
4.3 Proposed Improvements
5.0 Concluding Remarks and Suggested Next Steps
Appendices
A - Terms of Reference
B - Documents and/or Web
Sites Reviewed
C - Interview Guides
D - List of Interviewees
E - OIC's Suggested Reporting
Format
1.0 Introduction
1.1 Background and Purpose of Study
Background. The federal Access to Information Act (ATIA) came in force on July 1, 1983. The purpose of the ATIA is to afford Canadian citizens, permanent residents, and any person present in Canada the right to access information contained in government records, subject to certain specific and limited exemptions.
Goss Gilroy Inc. (GGI) is pleased to respond to the Access to Information Review Task Force's request for a review of the performance information used to measure the federal government's response to the ATIA. Broadly speaking, the scope of this review includes the Office of the Information Commissioner, the Treasury Board Secretariat, Parliament, and Access to Information and Privacy Legislation (ATIP) offices in federal government institutions.
In addition to establishing rights of access to Government information, the ATIA provides for a formal request mechanism that requesters may use to exercise those rights. These mechanisms include:
- time limits and other response obligations for the institutions holding the information; and,
- a way to lodge a complaint if a requester is not satisfied with how the institution handled a formal request.
The statute, regulations, and Treasury Board Policy and Guidelines clearly encourage institutions to provide access to information to which they are entitled without having to resort to the formal procedures provided for in the legislation, which is intended to complement, not replace, existing procedures for obtaining government information. Many requesters (there were more than 20,000 requests made in 2000-2001), however, access the formal request mechanisms available to them.
Departmental ATIP offices are generally responsible for processing all formal requests made to the institution under the Act, ensuring that the legal procedures and deadlines set out in the legislation are adhered to, and providing guidance and advice to departmental officials on the application and interpretation of the Act. Such ATIP offices carry out several functions, such as:
- providing advice to members of the public seeking access to documents;
- consulting with other departments, other levels of government, and
third parties on the release of documents; and,
- acting as the institution point of contact with both the Information and Privacy Commissioners' offices.
GGI has conducted reviews of the processes and procedures in place in several departmental units responsible for ATIP requests. These studies have shown that there are particular challenges unique to the units that provide ATIP services. One challenge is related to the system used to measure and report on the performance of the institutions.
Measuring ATI Performance. Currently, there are two bodies measuring the ATI performance - the Treasury Board Secretariat (TBS) and the Information Commissioner (IC). The TBS gathers a wide variety of statistics by institutions including: the number of requests, source of requests, distribution of requests completed, exemptions evoked, exclusions cited, completion time, extensions granted, translations required, method of access, fees and costs. This information is rolled up to give Parliamentarians an overview of institutions ATI profiles and processing results.
The IC, on the other hand, is primarily interested in ensuring that government institutions are compliant with the Act. To assess this they collect and analyse data pertaining to complaints made by requesters or registered by the OIC itself. In particular, the OIC collects information such as the status of complaints, complaint findings, turnaround time profiles, geographic distribution of complaints, notices of extensions and number of deemed refusals. [missed deadlines]
Key Questions for this Review. Key questions that form part of this review are: do current data (from TBS or IC) represent the real picture of how well the government is performing with ATI requests, and are there other data deemed useful for both Parliament and institutions for improving the performance of ATI itself?
Challenges for Most ATIP Offices. The challenge faced by most ATIP offices is that the information required by the TBS and the IC does not always lead to an accurate or useful portrayal of their performance. For instance, the data collected does not identify the cause and extent of problems and/or trends if they exist - thereby, making it difficult to pinpoint the origins of performance issues and avenues for correcting them. Because of these shortcomings, interested parties are often left with performance pictures that are often broad and in some cases, offering opposing conclusions.
Purpose of this Review. The main purpose of this review is threefold; namely:
- to assess the overall system of measurement and reporting of access to information;
- to identify key weaknesses in the identification, gathering and use of performance indicators; and,
- to offer suggestions for an alternative approach to performance measurement and reporting of ATI data.
Return to Table of Contents1.2 Scope & Methodology of the Study
Overview. The specific Terms of Reference for this review are given in Appendix A. After reviewing the documentation (see Appendix B for a listing of documents/websites reviewed), GGI prepared interview guides for discussions with key informants from selected Federal Departments, the Treasury Board Secretariat and the Office of the Information Commissioner (see Appendix C for copies of the guides). The Task Force reviewed these guides and gave GGI a list of individuals to interview from which a short but representative list of available resources was drawn (see Appendix D for list of interviewees). The informants were interviewed for approximately one hour each. The Deputy Information Commissioner did meet with GGI consultants for a full interview in March 2002. The Deputy Information Commissioner had read the GGI draft report and wanted to comment on its content; clarify some points made with respect to the Office of the Information Commissioner; and offer the OIC's suggestions for a possible Performance Reporting Format to be used by the TBS.
Overarching Performance Reporting Framework. As part of this review, an overarching performance reporting framework will be developed to accommodate the different informational needs of the government institutions, the TBS, the IC, and Parliament. It is expected that this framework would be used to generate information to enable improved monitoring and continual improvement of the ATI systems/processes, and eventually, of the Act itself and its administration.
The Access to Information Review Task Force expects that a more comprehensive performance reporting framework for ATI will result in better information being made available, which, in turn, will lead to a better understanding of the ATI program - encompassing its progress, challenges and failings and successful resolution of problems.
Team Approach and Methodology. GGI utilized a small fully dedicated
team to complete the tasks required. Concurrent to the interview process,
the GGI team developed a performance framework for the federal government's
ATIP offices based on the document review, the sample of interviews and
the team's previous experiences with such frameworks. This framework (or
model) was then presented to the Task Force as an underlying basis for
analysing the ATI data needs and reporting requirements. Upon further
discussions with the Task Force, refinements to the model were made. The
GGI team then analysed the interview responses and background documents
to determine the current situation of ATI in conjunction with this performance
model for ATIP. This analysis, along with the related conclusions, forms
the basis of the remainder of this report.
2.0 Assessing Performance Under Access to Information
2.1 The Access to Information Act
Parliament passed, in 1982, the Access to Information Act, the express purpose of which is to:
to extend 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 [Section (2)(1)].
This right of access is afforded to Canadian citizens, permanent residents
and any person present in Canada. The Act identifies which Government
of Canada institutions are subject to the Act. It details how to make
a request, the time frames within which federal institutions must process
requests, fees that may be charged for requests and the types of information
that may be excluded or exempted from requests. It also describes procedures
for registering complaints with the Office of the Information Commissioner
and how the Office will proceed with investigating and resolving such
complaints, including review by the Federal Court.
2.2 The Access to Information Program
Five key players are involved in the delivery of the provisions of the Act. Departments and Agencies receive requests review and release (where appropriate) information requested under the Act. The Treasury Board Secretariat provides direction and guidance for the administration of the Act across government, while the Department of Justice provides a legal advisory role to departments and agencies in their dealings under the Act. The Office of the Information Commissioner provides an oversight function. Parliament, through the House Standing Committee on Justice and the Human Rights, is charged with monitoring the administration of the Act and may propose legislative changes as appropriate.
The efforts that these five key players engage in during the delivery of the Act can be cast as a program - the Access to Information (ATI) Program. Such a program can be modeled in terms of its performance, i.e., the activities the ATI Program would undertake, the outputs produced as a consequence of these activities and the results that these outputs are expected to achieve.
Performance models provide a number of benefits. Some of these include:
- a shared understanding of a program's key results;
- the identification of key activities that will lead to optimum performance;
- a framework for setting priorities and assigning resources; and,
- a basis for establishing a performance measurement system.
A performance model also provides a framework for managing the performance of a program. The activities provide the basic starting point. Are they being carried out - either formally or informally? Are they achieving their desired impacts? What can be done to improve performance?
The model can be used under both normal and extraordinary circumstances. In the case of the latter, imagine a sudden and unanticipated surge in demand - much like the one Human Resources and Development Canada faced a year or so ago. The model's activities suggest a structured process for dealing with it.
The model also suggests a reporting framework: i) what demands did we anticipate and how did we expect to deal with them? ii) what actually happened? and, iii) how successful were we in dealing with expected and unanticipated demands, if any?
In summary, a performance model provides a framework for identifying what data are needed to assess the performance of the ATI Program and how these should be reported. More importantly, however, the model suggests a framework for managing the program and its performance. It can be used for resourcing, assigning priorities and focusing on areas which may be problematic in terms of program delivery.
2.4 The ATI Program Performance Model
The Access to Information Program contains seven key activities. First, there is a need to monitor and analyze demands for information. This leads to developing strategies and approaches to meet these demands which are then implemented. These strategies and approaches should help institutions when they receive requests, retrieve information, review it and, where appropriate, release it. Any complaints in this process are investigated and resolved. Finally, the strategies and approaches developed and implemented to deal with demands for information are assessed. The following sections describe these activities in more detail and identify the results that each are expected to achieve.
2.4.1 Monitor/Analyze Demands for Information
To function effectively, the Access to Information Program would need to know what demands are being placed on it and how these are changing over time. Institutions would monitor and analyze demands placed on them for information while the Treasury Board Secretariat would do this for government as a whole. In a sense, this is the Program's intelligence function. It includes both surveillance and analysis elements. It is akin to an environmental scan. This function tracks "demands" in the broadest sense. It acts as a type of radar, in that it monitors a variety of existing, new and emerging demands for information. This monitoring provides the Program's senior management with information on which to base its short- and long-term plans. It may include the following sub-activities:
1) Building, operating and maintaining databases and information systems (such as the Coordination of Access to Information Requests System (CAIRS) and ATIPflow). This also requires investment in establishing links to these existing databases and monitoring systems.
2) Carrying out research and analysis fundamental to the Program's operations (both at the institution level and across government as a whole) and to its ability to carry out surveillance activities.
3) Collecting and analyzing operational data on demands that help identify emerging trends in demands for information.
4) Building, operating and maintaining networks and alliances that lead to early warning of shifting demands and to the sharing of experiences amongst departments and agencies.
Monitoring and analyzing demands for information should result in faster,
better coordinated identification of emerging trends and increased, more
reliable information being available.
Analyzing trends can indicate recurring demands for particular types of
information. These can be systematized. In some cases, the information
could be proactively released on an ongoing basis thereby reducing the
need to go through the formal access process for that type of information.
In cases where this could not be done, the information could be prepared
in advance so that ATIP turnaround times could be significantly reduced.
Analyzing trends may also indicate a lack of understanding on the part of the organization's staff as to what types of information need to go through the ATI process and what types do not. Such analysis could assist in identifying classes of records which are appropriate for informal release and the best methods of doing so. Similarly, analyzing trends may identify bottlenecks and/or pinpoint processes which could be streamlined or re-engineered to make them more timely.
