There are some post-secondary institutions in Manitoba that are operating under a veil of secrecy, while another conducts themselves in a transparent manner a freedom of information (FOI) request by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) revealed.

The CTF sent FOI requests to the University of Manitoba, University of Winnipeg, Red River College and Brandon University asking for expense and travel claims for the president and vice-presidents of these institutions dating back to 2004.

Following a lengthy process, the CTF's request was met with the onerous obstacle of a $2300 fee assessment from the University of Manitoba, Brandon University and Red River College just to answer the inquiry - must be a lot of receipts!

To their credit, the University of Winnipeg answered the FOI request in the time allotted, and provided all of the information requested, including receipts with no fee attached. The U of W president, five vice-presidents and general counsel spent a total of $82,000 on travel and various expenses to such destinations as Cairo, Hong Kong, Azerbaijan and San Diego. Detailed explanations were also provided for the purpose of each of these trips, some which are certainly questionable. For instance, was it necessary for the Vice-President of Research and Graduate Studies to travel to Cairo twice in one year That type of travel is certainly enough to peak a watchdog's interest - which leads to the larger point of why did the other three institutions need $2300 in fees, when the precedent had already been set by the U of W to provide the information free of charge

Under FOI legislation, an applicant is granted two hours of "free" research time (the CTF in a FOI review submission recommended this be increased to three hours), a fee is assessed if more time is required to fulfill the request, i.e. photo copying or computer programming, etc. There has been a 50 percent increase in fees since 2000. This increase amounts to an obvious and significant barrier to access government information. Further, the provincial government has collected nearly $30,000 in FOI fees in the past 6 years.

In our modern era of technology, most government institutions keep electronic records; therefore, there is no justification for placing extra restrictions on the obligation of a public body to disclose records kept in electronic form.

Freedom of information is a fundamental democratic right which enhances timely access to substantive critical government information necessary for the full discussion of policy proposals and for holding governments to account for their actions, inaction and performance.

Manitoba's former Ombudsman was very critical when it came to government institutions and their commitment to FIPPA: " . . . this is not always evident especially when the process is subject to delays, to questionable denials of access, fees or to breaches of personal information privacy, due diligence has not been done."

Why some academic institutions in Manitoba want to be paid for information that taxpayers have already paid for is inexplicable. Perhaps they need to be reminded that freedom doesn't only come in the academic sense, but also when it comes to releasing information.