Deb Matthews confirms closed opaque government

I heard from Minister Deb Matthews regarding my latest attempt to have her answer my many unanswered questions regarding her government's decision to hide abortion statistics.

From her response, I conclude that Deb Matthews

• doesn't care that CIHI is unable to give accurate abortion statistics;
• is aware that the abortion exclusion clause was never debated in the Legislature; 
• is unable or unwilling to share with the citizens of Ontario, the reasons she decided to exclude abortion services from FIPPA;
• is unable or unwilling to share with the citizens of Ontario, why abortion services were the only medical service excluded from the act;
• is unable or unwilling to share with the citizens of Ontario how the abortion exclusion clause enhances openness and transparency.

Here are my questions to her again:

"I have contacted CIHI on numerous occasions already about this [accurate abortion statistics]. Because of the way CIHI produces those statistics (i.e. they base their statistics on hospital discharge records and not medical billing records), they were unable to produce more accurate statistics. Therefore contacting CIHI again (as you suggest), will still not yield accurate statistics. So again I ask you, can you please provide me with a way to obtain accurate abortion statistics?

You say that "These amendments were debated and passed in the Legislature." My question was to provide the links to when the abortion exclusion clause was debated. Not to other amendments.

So I once again reviewed all 20 links on the Bill, from the link you provided me, including the transcripts of the public hearings on the bill on November 22 and 23. There were no instances in any of these documents, where the abortion exclusion was discussed, debated, or mentioned. 

Therefore I must assume that the abortion exclusion clause was not debated in the legislature. Please correct me if I am wrong about this assumption.

I asked you what rationale the government had for excluding abortion services from FIPPA. I couldn't find your response to this question in your letter. Perhaps you missed my question? If so, would you be so kind as to answer it for me now?

I asked you why abortion was the only taxpayer funded medical service singled out for exclusion from FIPPA. I couldn't find your response to this question in your letter to me. Perhaps you missed my question? If so, would you be so kind as to answer it for me now?

I asked you how excluding abortion services from FIPPA "enhances openness and transparency in the public sector"? Perhaps you missed my question? If so, would you be as so kind to answer it for me now?"

Here is her response to me:

Dear Ms. Maloney:

Thank you for your recent email regarding the abortion exclusion clause under the Freedom of Information and Privacy Act (FIPPA).

I can only reiterate what I stated in my previous response to you.  The passing of the Broader Public Sector Accountability Act, 2010, that amended FIPPA, followed the customary legislative process of ensuring there was opportunity for public scrutiny, input and debate.

Public hearings were held on the bill providing interested parties with ample opportunity to raise their concerns and share their views on any issues related to the proposed legislation to be brought forward and be considered.

I'm sorry that the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) was unable to provide you with the statistics you were looking for.

Again, thank you for taking the time to write to me about this issue. 

Sincerely,
ORIGINAL SIGNED BY

Deb Matthews
Minister

From this I can only conclude that Deb Matthews knows that her government is neither open, nor accountable nor transparent; and that the abortion exclusion clause was enacted for purely ideological reasons.