As the NDP is learning, freedom of information is cut and dried when you’re not the one under the microscope. In government, things are more complicated.
In my experience, there are several problems with the way FOI is handled in B.C. Several are solvable, but there’s one overarching issue I don’t see an easy way around.
Start with the easily fixed issues. First, quality control. FOI requests are often ridiculously broad. It’s one thing to search your files or inbox for a specific term if you’re given a tight date range. But far too often, we’d be faced with Herculean fishing expeditions such as: “any direct or indirect reference to transit since 2010.”
Second, a better mechanism for communicating to those making FOI requests when they’re barking up the wrong tree or asking for information that doesn’t exist. It’s easy to make a cross-government request, and just as easy to jump to the wrong conclusion when 18 out of 19 ministries come back with zero results on a file they have nothing to do with.
Similarly, sometimes FOI requests come in for things that have nothing to do with work. For example, we’d sometimes receive requests for information about the premier’s vacation, or even her wardrobe choices. Those also came back “no results,” because Christy Clark didn’t expect us to book her holidays, or dress her.
You might giggle, but at least one very bright light out there thought we did.
Third, there is sometimes an unreasonable expectation for documentation. Once, the premier’s press secretary and I were copied on an interview request from a blogger. I remember only because he then made an FOI request for all email correspondence between us that day, even our deleted emails.
There were no results, which I believe he saw as evidence of some kind of coverup. If memory serves, he said as much on the radio. But the simple truth is, we literally sat next to each other.
How often do you send a “you see this?” email to someone within whispering distance? And if every media request is supposed to trigger a chain of lovingly crafted internal emails, nothing else would ever get done.
The biggest issue, however, is the basic contradiction between the duty to document and your job description as a political staffer.
We’re not talking about the broader public service and bureaucracy, where recommendations are supposed to be made with no consideration to filthy, filthy politics. You might believe everyone paid by the government purse should act the same way, but that’s a different conversation. The reality is that elected members have some staff who look out for their interests and their interests alone.
A political staffer’s job is to make your minister look good. That means putting him or her in a position to succeed, making sure they’re well briefed, and knowing the people in the room and what they want. Depending on the day, you’re the minister’s eyes, ears, hands and legs.
It also means, very occasionally, stepping forward and intervening when you think they’re making a mistake. Take the recent case of Agriculture Minister Lana Popham’s now-infamous fish-farm letter.
The records show several staffers raised concerns about the tone and content.
They worried — rightly — that regardless of her intent, given the minister’s public history as an activist (and slightly less public reputation as a hothead), it would be perceived as an inappropriate threat — at best.
They were right. The premier himself had to waste valuable time on damage control.
Put yourself in their shoes. Your explicit job is to protect your minister and government from embarrassment.
You could outline your objections in an email, which might well get lost among the hundreds of emails staffers and ministers receive every day. Worse, your email might eventually be public, further embarrassing your minister, contrary to your job description.
Or, you could pick up the phone. It’s faster, more urgent, with no worrying about your tone being misread or the long gaze of posterity.
I dare say most people would do the latter — and they’d be right.
Yes, people deserve to know what their government is up to. But I don’t think absolute transparency is feasible, for the same reason they don’t put glass doors on bathroom stalls.
Maclean Kay was former premier Christy Clark’s speechwriter for five years.
