The New Brunswick government plans to table legislation next spring as part of a commitment to ensure more public access to information.
Proposed changes will be at least partly informed by recommendations from a review of the Right to Information and Protection of Privacy Act.
“We are grateful for the feedback we received throughout the review,” Finance Minister René Legacy said in a release. “We asked New Brunswickers how we can make this system better, and what they told us will be carefully considered as we work to improve transparency and safeguard New Brunswickers’ privacy.”
Recommendations focused on three major areas:
- Strengthening transparency and accountability
- Enhancing privacy safeguards
- Improving right-to-information operations.
According to the review, New Brunswickers want more timely and meaningful access to information.
The review also found public bodies face challenges responding to requests for a variety of reasons, including limited capacity, training needs, records management issues, complex requests and the growing volume of digital records.
One objective of the review is to improve New Brunswick’s right-to-information legislation, so it ranks among the best in Canada.
The goal is to reach a score of 100 out of 150 in the Canadian right-to-information law rating.
Currently, only Newfoundland and Labrador has passed that rating.
The full report can be found here.
