2013-2014 Public Works and Government Services Canada

Originally known as the Board of Works, Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) was created in its current form in 1993 through the amalgamation of several departments. PWGSC provides government departments, boards and agencies with support services for their programs.

In 2013–2014, PWGSC received 718 requests,^{Note de bas de page 1} a decrease of 11.4% compared to 2012–2013 (810 requests). The institutions also processed proportionally less pages per request completed. The overall decrease in workload has allowed PWGSC to complete proportionally more requests in 2013–2014. As such, PWGSC completed about 83% of requests in inventory, compared to 74.4% in 2012–2013.

While PWGSC’s results in 2013–2014 were similar to those achieved in 2012–2013, they were below government-wide levels on most indicators.

Requests were received in 2013–2014 came from primarily three categories of requestors: the public (35.2%), the private sector (32%) and the media (26.9%).

An additional 214 requests for previously released ATI packages were also released informally during 2013–2014.

Table 1. Workload

About 7.75% of requests required processing of more than 1,000 pages, compared to 11.9% in 2012–2013.^{Note de bas de page 2} While the average number of pages processed per request significantly increased in 2012–2013 (514 pages), it went down to 360 pages in 2013–2014, which is similar to 2011–2012 (396 pages).

Timeliness

In 2013–2014, PWGSC completed to 345 requests within 30 days or less, which represents 41.7% of requests closed in 2013–2014 (similar to the last reporting period). In comparison, 61% of completed requests government-wide were responded to within 30 days in 2013–2014. The average number of days to complete a request in 2013–2014 was 105 days.^{Note de bas de page 3}

The proportion of requests completed in more than 120 days in 2013–2014 (27.9%) was similar to 2012–2013 but significantly higher than the proportion government-wide (10.7%).

The proportion of requests closed past the statutory or extended deadline increased by about 2.6%, from 8% in 2012–2013 to 10.6% in 2013–2014. The proportion achieved in 2013–2014 represents a “C” grade.^{Note de bas de page 4} According to PWGSC’s annual report on the administration of the Act, late requests in 2013–2014 took, on average, an additional 149 days to complete, compared to 182 days in 2012–2013. Further, most of the late requests had already been extended (93.2%).

The reasons invoked for missing statutory or extended deadlines included external consultations (39.8%) other reasons (30.68%) and workload (27.3%).^{Note de bas de page 5}

Extension

PWGSC took 673 extensions to complete the 828 requests completed in 2013–2014.^{Note de bas de page 6} This represents a ratio of about 0.81 extensions per request completed, which is one of the highest ratio among the examined institutions. This is similar to the last reporting period.

Of the 673 extensions taken, 74 extensions (or 11%) were for 30 days or less in 2013–2014. PWGSC also mentioned that, on average, extensions were of 132 days in 2013–2014 (decrease compared to 2012–2013, 174–day average).

Figure 1. Length of extensions (2011–2012 to 2013–2014)

Extensions taken under section 9(1)(b) (consultations other than section 69) represented about 47% of all extensions taken. An additional 38.6% of them were taken to consult a third party, pursuant to section 9(1)(c).

Disclosure

Of the 828 requests completed, 17.9% were disclosed entirely, which represents a 2% increase compared to 2012–2013. However, this proportion is still above the government-wide results (26.8%).

In 2013–2014, about 68.2% of the pages processed were disclosed, compared to 57.8% in 2012–2013.

Exemptions/Exclusions

A total of 1,512 exemptions and 91 exclusions were invoked to withdraw information from disclosure in 2013–2014, representing about 1.94 exemptions/exclusions per request completed. In comparison, this ratio was of 1.91 in 2012–2013.

Most common applied exemptions were: third-party information (469 times), personal information (385 times) and operations of government (252 times). This is comparable to the last reporting period.

Table 2. Performance

Other activities

According to its annual report 2013–2014, PWGSC has updated its internal Policy on the Access to Information to reflect changes made to access to information policies and directives. These modifications included the duty to assist requesters, the access to records in the Minister’s office and suspected contraventions of section 67.1 of the Access to Information Act.

PWGSC also provided 15 training and awareness sessions during 2013–2014 to about 195 employees of the Department.

Complaints

In 2013–2014, the number of complaints received against PWGSC^{Note de bas de page 7} decreased from 35 in 2012–2013 to 28 in 2013–2014.

Refusal complaints accounted for 17 of the complaints received in 2013–2014. The number of administrative complaints went down from 19 complaints in 2012–2013 to 11 in 2013–2014.

As of April 2015, 9 of the complaints received in 2013–2014 were still pending. Of the completed complaints, 10 were well founded, 6 were not well-founded, 1 was settled and 2 were discontinued.