Bilingualism ruling ends transparency project
Posted access-to-info documents must be available in both official languages: commissioner
A pioneering effort to make the federal government more transparent has been shut down.
The National Capital Commission (NCC) removed hundreds of original documents from its website after an adverse ruling from the official languages commissioner.
The NCC had been routinely web-posting all the internal documents it released to requesters under the Access to Information Act, to make the information widely available to the public. The material was posted in the original language of each document, largely English.
But the project was halted after Canada’s languages commissioner ruled that the agency was violating the Official Languages Act by failing to publish the documents simultaneously in French and English. The commissioner gave the NCC until August either to translate everything, which would be expensive, or withdraw the material from the web.
“The link to previously completed access to information requests is no longer available,” confirmed NCC spokesperson Melanie Amyotte. “This ensures the NCC continues to be compliant with the Official Languages Act.”
CBC/Radio-Canada also posts access-to-information releases on its website, though only those documents it deems of broad interest rather than everything it processes under the legislation. The languages commissioner also slammed the Crown corporation for its unilingual posts, and imposed an August deadline either to translate everything or stop the practice.
CBC/Radio-Canada continues to post unilingual ATIA documents. A spokesman declined to say what the Crown corporation plans to do in light of the commissioner’s ruling.
“We have no updates to share with you at this time,” media relations specialist Eric Wright said in an email.
Library and Archives Canada (LAC) also posts historical documents it releases through Access to Information Act requests, arguing that their publication supports its mandate to preserve and disseminate historical government material from various departments.
LAC does not post operational documents about its own activities, which presumably would require simultaneous translations under the languages legislation. Library and Archives Canada was not investigated by the languages commissioner.
The February 2025 ruling said the Official Languages Act clearly compels departments to provide simultaneous translations of all material published on the web, including access-to-information documents.
“As a result, these documents must be published simultaneously and be of equal quality in both official languages,” Raymond Theberge wrote in his decision, which gave NCC and CBC six months to comply.
Read the ruling here:
Theberge’s investigation was triggered by a 2023 complaint from Ottawa law professor Matt Malone who, paradoxically, is a strong proponent of transparency and had hoped the two institutions would challenge any adverse ruling.
“This was a gamble to defeat the government’s position that we can’t have any transparency because we can’t offer everything in both official languages,” Malone said in an email. “Sadly, the gamble did not pay off.”
“Because the government refuses to embrace a culture of disclosure by default, the idea was to attack a claim they’ve hidden behind: bilingualism requirements prevent us from being more transparent.”
Last year, Pierre Trudel – a law professor at the University of Montreal – told Le Devoir that the rights of French-speaking Internet users are not being violated by English-only postings.
Trudel, a specialist in freedom of information, said federal institutions could post unilingual documents and consider translating some of them on request.
Malone noted that a non-government group, the Investigative Journalism Foundation, already posts federal access-to-information documents online, including material from the NCC and CBC/Radio Canada. The Open By Default project, initiated by Malone, also allows users to search within the documents.