Decisions

The complainant alleged that the extension of time the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) took under subsection 9(1) of the Access to Information Act to respond to an access request was unreasonable. The request was for all correspondence, including emails, Microsoft (MS) Teams messages, texts and phone messages, sent and received by Iain Stewart, between June 14 and June 21, 2021. The requester also specified that they would not “re-scope or limit” their request.

PHAC notified the complainant that, pursuant to paragraphs 9(1)(a) and 9(1)(b), it would require an additional 1,950 days to complete the processing of the request.

PHAC demonstrated that the time extensions were necessary and for a reasonable period, given the circumstances.

The complaint is not well founded.

The complainant alleged that Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) has improperly withheld information under paragraph 20(1)(c) (financial impact on a third party) of the Access to Information Act in response to an access request for information related to the Technology Partnerships Canada (TPC) program including the Total Repayment figures related to several projects.

The scope of the complaint was narrowed to information related to twenty-one (21) third parties.

Several third parties and ISED provided representations in support of the exemption. However, neither the third parties nor ISED demonstrated that the information at issue met all of the requirements of the exemption.

The Information Commissioner ordered ISED to disclose all information at issue.

ISED gave notice that it would implement the order.

The complaint is well founded.

An institution submitted an application to the Information Commissioner for approval to decline to act on two requests for access to information under subsection 6.1(1) of the Access to Information Act. The institution stated that the access requests were vexatious and constituted an abuse of the right to make a request for access to records. The institution further submitted that it had met its duty to assist the requester in connection with the request.

The Commissioner found that the institution not only did not fulfill its duty to assist obligations under subsection 4(2.1) of the Act, but it also failed to establish that the requests were made in bad faith or were otherwise an abuse of the right to make a request.

The Commissioner denied the applications.