Prime Minister’s Office should be covered by access law, info commissioner tells MPs

Information commissioner Caroline Maynard appears as a witness before a Senate committee in Ottawa on Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2024. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick)

OTTAWA — Information commissioner Caroline Maynard says Canadians should be able to use the Access to Information Act to request documents from the offices of the prime minister and other cabinet members.

Maynard renewed her call to expand the scope of the access law to cover these offices during an appearance before a House of Commons committee Monday.

Speaking in French, Maynard said the right to information is a quasi-constitutional one, “and so I believe that Canadians need to have access to the information that belongs to them.”

All federal agencies should have adequate resources to answer Access to Information requests, she said. “Every department, every institution, every agency should have a dedicated team.”

For a $5 fee, people can use the access law to ask for federal documents — anything from internal emails to reports and policy memos — but the law is widely seen as outdated and unevenly administered.

Federal agencies are supposed to either respond to an access request within 30 days or provide reasons why more time is needed.

Many users complain of lengthy delays and exemptions in the law that result in the release of heavily blacked-out documents.

The House’s standing committee on access to information, privacy and ethics is embarking on its latest study of the much-criticized system.

As well as pushing to broaden the law, Maynard has advocated for limiting the application of certain exemptions. She has also called for the addition of a public interest override to ensure the release of vital information, and a maximum length of time for consultations needed to respond to access requests.

Despite numerous studies and recommendations over the years, the access law has changed little since it took effect in 1983.

Among the few notable changes is the power given to the information commissioner in 2019 to order federal agencies to respond to requests by a specific deadline.

The federal Treasury Board, which reviews the Access to Information regime every five years, began its latest study last June.

A draft discussion paper prepared for the Treasury Board review expressed reservations about the information commissioner’s steady increase in the use of her powers to issue legally binding orders to departments, saying it was “becoming challenging for institutions to manage.”

Maynard told the MPs on Monday the power was “a very useful tool” for her office.

“The order-making power allows me to stop investigations from going forever,” she said.

“Sometimes we have no choice, and the institution has to know there’s a date by which they have to answer the requester, and those orders are necessary for that.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 9, 2026.

Jim Bronskill, The Canadian Press