Bob Mackin
The NDP government is withholding the calendars of top officials, including Premier David Eby’s, longer than it promised.
It is also keeping the lists of no-bid contracts for 2026’s first quarter secret.
In March, theBreaker.news reported that the Ministry of Citizens’ Services quietly told visitors to the Open Information website that it was “transitioning to a modernized system,” so it would not upload new information for the time being.
Premier David Eby at cabinet meetings with First Nations in the Vancouver Convention Centre. (BC Gov/Flickr?
The Ministry called it a “temporary, one-time pause to support the technical migration” to the new FOI Mod system by early April.
The most-recent calendars and no-bid contract lists are from December 2025.
theBreaker.news asked the Ministry to send copies of the premier’s calendar and no-bid contract lists, but the Ministry refused.
Not consistent
The Ministry claimed it was not technically feasible to publish on the current system while transitioning to a new one.
“That’s also inconsistent with how virtually any consumer-facing web project is done by anybody else,” Conservative Gavin Dew (Kelowna-Mission) said in a March interview.
Generally, a new version of a website is developed in a so-called “sandbox environment” and then the website address is transferred to the new version when ready to launch, Dew said.
Coming in May?
Jayasree Lanka, in the Ministry’s communications office, sent theBreaker.news a prepared statement that said “Open Information is in the final stage of transitioning to their new system.”
All directives from January onward are loaded and the ministry is testing a new publication tool.
“We expect this testing to be done in the coming weeks. From there will be able to publish the remaining outstanding directives quickly. They are already prepared and will be released as soon as we receive confirmation that the publication functionality is ready.”
Asked to define “coming weeks,” Lanka said May.
What it is
Under section 71 of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, public bodies must designate categories of records to be published without an FOI request.
The Open Information website is a legacy of the former BC Liberal government, which directed bureaucrats in 2016 to publish Ministers’ and Deputy Ministers’ calendars, directly awarded contracts, ministers’ travel receipts and summaries of contracts with values over $10,000.
It is not the first time the NDP government stopped updating Proactive Disclosures. It did so during the pandemic and last fall’s B.C. General Employees’ Union strike.
Trend watch
In 2021, the NDP imposed a non-refundable, $10 tax on freedom of information requests.
In February, Eby’s government tabled Bill 9, amendments to the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act that it claimed would “improve the experience of people” using the FOI system.
In 1992, the NDP government under Premier Mike Harcourt passed the original law and one of the architects was lawyer Rob Botterell, a 2024-elected Green Party MLA (Saanich North and the Islands).
During second reading debate on March 11, Botterell spent 100 minutes explaining why the law is needed and why the amendments — which empower bureaucrats to arbitrarily delay or deny information requests — are not.
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