2012-2013 Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), as the national public broadcaster, provides radio and television services to Canadians, incorporating a range of programming in English, French and Aboriginal languages. CBC was part of the 70 institutions that became subject to the Access to Information Act in 2006 and 2007 under the Federal Accountability Act.

CBC received 154 requests during 2012-13, a decrease compared to 2011-12 (218 requests). Overall, CBC’s performance was stronger than the government-wide average, except for requests where all information is disclosed.

CBC completed 83.5%^{Footnote 1} of all requests in its inventory in 2012-13. The average time to complete a request was 38 days.^{Footnote 2} CBC noted in its annual report that more than 1,900 visits were registered on the Corporation’s Transparency and Accountability website, where already disclosed records of public interest are posted.

The number of pages processed per request went down significantly in 2012-13, with 82% of requests requiring 100 pages or less to process.

Table 1: Workload

Measures	Reporting Period 2011-12	Reporting Period 2012-13	Difference
Number of requests received	218	154	-29.36%
Number of consultations received (from other government institutions)	35	29	-17.14%
Average number of pages processed per request closed	457	154	-303
% of requests for which more than 1000 pages were processed	4.05%	5.19%	1.14%
Note: The average number of pages processed per request closed and the percentage of requests for which more than 1,000 pages were are calculated from the total of requests completed for which the information was disclosed (in part or totally), exempted/excluded and for requests abandoned. It excludes requests completed for the following dispositions: no records exist, requests transferred and requests treated informally.

Timeliness

CBC closed 101 requests within 30 days, representing about 66.5% of requests closed during the reporting period 2012-13. This is about 13% lower than in 2011-12.^{Footnote 3}

CBC was able to maintain its performance in terms of timeliness, as recorded in its 2011-12 report card, with only 1.32 percent of its requests completed past the statutory deadline in 2012-13^{Footnote 4} . This rate represents an “A” grade.^{Footnote 5}

Extensions

In 2012-13, CBC took 42 extensions to close 152 requests. In 2011-12, 41 extensions were taken to complete 208 requests.

79% of the extensions taken were for more than 30 days.^{Footnote 6}

57% of the extensions were for consulting with a third party (section 9(1)(c)).

Disclosure

Of the requests completed, 11.2% were disclosed entirely, which is similar to the last two reporting periods. In comparison, the government-wide disclosure rate was 21.6% in 2012-13.

The proportion of pages processed that were disclosed increased significantly (34.4%) between 2011-12 and 2012-13.

Table 2: Performance

Measures	Reporting Period 2011-12	Reporting Period 2012-13	Difference
Completion of Requests
Completion rate	88.14%	83.52%	-4.62%
Completion Time
% of requests closed within 30 days	79.81%	66.45%	-13.36%
% of requests closed past statutory deadline	4.33%	1.32%	-3.01%
% of consultations from government institution closed within 30 days	89.19%	96.30%	7.11%
% of extensions of 30 days or less	17.07%	21.43%	4.36%
Level of Disclosure
% of pages processed that were disclosed	24.43%	58.83%	34.40%
% of requests closed for which the information was disclosed entirely	11.06%	11.18%	0.12%
Note: The completion rate represents the number of requests completed divided by the total number of requests on hand, which includes the new requests received and the requests carried over from the previous reporting period.

Complaints

The number of complaints received by the OIC against CBC decreased in 2012-13 to 45 (in comparison to 71 in 2011-2012). Of the 56 complaints completed with findings in 2012-2013, 40 were considered well-founded and 16 not well-founded.