Ontario government will not appeal our FOI case

This is great news. For us. For Ontario citizens. For people who love democracy. For people who love freedom of expression rights. For people who love justice.

Hiding abortion information = unaccountable government

This story is interesting. For a couple of reasons: Mount Sinai Hospital’s refusal to eliminate one fetus from twin pregnancy triggers human rights battle

First of all, the story is about a woman who was refused an abortion on one of the two unborn twins she was carrying. Also known as a fetal reduction. Because she was refused, she hired lawyer Amir Attaran to file a complaint to the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal, alleging discrimination on the basis of sex and family status. The woman wanted to see the policy of Mt. Sinai hospital:

"In an odd twist to the story, a recently prepared written policy on the issue — replacing the unwritten one followed at the time of the woman’s pregnancy last year — indicates the hospital has indeed reversed its position [on refusing the abortion].

"The policy — obtained by Attaran under Freedom of Information laws after hospital lawyers refused to divulge it — says elective fetal reduction is “ethically complex and divides many people,” but that patient autonomy should be given primacy in the area."

My radar immediately went up. How could Attaran obtain the policy from the hospital--a policy that is clearly about abortion--when all abortion related information in Ontario is excluded by the Freedom of Information and Privacy Act? So I checked with Mr. Attaran, and he confirmed for me that he did indeed obtain the information through an access to information request.

(As an aside, I contacted the hospital myself six days ago and asked them how this could happen. The hospital never responded to me.)

Second, so why was a lawyer able to get information, when I, a pro-life person, would not be able to get the same information? Because you may recall that I can no longer obtain access to abortion information from hospitals/government in Ontario. I don't know if Mr. Attaran is pro-choice or not, but I'm pretty sure the woman who hired him is pro-choice (clue: she had an abortion).

Third, this is a good example of pro-choice people also wanting to hold their hospitals/government to being open, transparent and accountable. Just like pro-life people want their hospitals/government to be open, transparent and accountable.

(Mind you if this woman and her lawyer were refused the information, I'm pretty sure the media would have been falling all over themselves with this story in a much broader way. After all, she was refused an abortion--the horror.)

Finally, guess how many fetal reductions there were in 2010? Seventy seven (77). Guess how many fetal reductions were done in 2011? We don't know. How many were done in 2012? We don't know. How many were done in 2013? We don't know. How many were done in 2014? We don't know. How many were done in 2015? We don't know.

Have fetal reductions gone up? Have they gone down? We have no idea. That's what happens when we allow our government to hide abortion information from us. Well, from some of us anyway.

What you can do when you hide abortion statistics

This is interesting. Seems the Australia government has been making stuff up. Government officials there have said that smoking rates have gone down in Australia since the government introduced plain packaging on cigarettes. But that isn't actually true. Smoking rates have actually gone up in Australia:

"The most recent national survey of smoking rates published by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare in 2014 does not appear to indicate plain packaging helped accelerate the 22-year downward trend. Instead, it suggests youth smoking may have increased over the 2010­–13 period it covers, with reported daily smoking among 12 to 17 year olds climbing from 2.5 to 3.4 per cent. 

Indeed, despite all the publicity surrounding the introduction of the new packs, the survey found the percentage of Australians citing health warnings as a reason for smoking less or quitting fell from 15.2 per cent in 2010 to 11.1 in 2013. 

Separate data collected across four of Australia’s six states suggest smoking rates actually increased between 2012­–13. 

“The Australian government finds itself in an embarrassing situation having trumpeted its policy only to find that despite all the rhetoric that tobacco prevalence didn’t fall,” says economist Sinclair Davidson, an economist at Melbourne’s RMIT University and a plain-packaging critic.

Now on the other side of the world, namely here in in Ontario, where we have the Kathleen Wynn government, Ontario hides anything and everything related to abortion. Suppose that, Ontario Liberal politicians decided to make something up about abortion? For instance, what if they announced that abortion rates had gone down in Ontario? We would have no way of knowing if that was true or not, would we?

Charter challenge for hiding abortion information

We (ARPA and myself) have now served our application record to the Attorney General of Ontario for our Charter Challenge. Hiding information from taxpayers isn't transparent, open and accountable.

Our application records:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_QDsYLWnwO6bnY3Y2pqd21EYlk/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_QDsYLWnwO6WnBKcEJ1QThTeFU/view?usp=sharing

In fact, the Ontario Government's decision to exclude abortion information from the public directly contravenes their own "Open Data Directive".

"Ontario’s Open Data Directive maximizes access to government data by requiring all data to be made public, unless it is exempt for legal, privacy, security, confidentiality or commercially-sensitive reasons. It sets out key principles and requirements for publishing open data, and applies to data created and managed by Ontario ministries and provincial agencies."

None of these exemptions apply to the abortion information I was trying to get. So why are they hiding it? Good question.

Ontario PCs - hold Liberals to account for hidden agenda

Dear Monte [McNaughton],

I received your letter in the mail asking me for a donation to your [Progressive Conservative] party. I might consider giving the party a donation, if your party would stand up in the House and ask the question I asked Patrick Brown below (to which I never received a response). And, if your party would actively advocate and make an issue of this undemocratic, secretive law. 

If and when I hear that the PC Party is actively engaged on this issue, and holding the Liberals to account for their secret agenda on this, please contact me again.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Patricia Maloney

http://run-with-life.blogspot.ca/p/blog-page.html

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Patricia Maloney <maloneyp64@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Sep 15, 2015 at 1:44 PM
Subject: Liberals hiding medical information
To: patrick.brown@ontariopc.com
Cc: Patricia Maloney <maloneyp64@gmail.com>

Dear Patrick,

Congratulations on your recent victory for your seat in the Ontario Legislature.

As you know I am taking the Ontario government to court with my Charter Challenge.

Could you ask Kathleen Wynne a question during question period about their hiding information about a tax-funded medical procedure (abortion), and why they did it without a word of debate in the legislature?

I have asked Kathleen and the then Minister Deb Matthews for their reasons for this, and they have continually refused to answer me.

Please let me know if you need any additional information.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Patricia Maloney

http://run-with-life.blogspot.ca/p/blog-page.html

What is Kathleen Wynne's hidden agenda?

We actually have a Canadian politician speaking out against the Kathleen Wynne's Liberals decision to hide all abortion statistics. Rod Taylor from the Christian Heritage Party:

"When governments try to cover up facts and statistics, it usually sends a signal that they are hiding something they are ashamed of, something that would prove embarrassing or hard to explain to voters and taxpayers. When they cover up the cover-up, that signal gets even louder."

Seems about right.

So exactly what is Kathleen Wynne trying to hide from Ontarians? Are abortion rates doubling? Are they tripling? If she had nothing to hide there would be no need to do this. What is she covering up from us?

Must be pretty awful or she wouldn't have to hide it.

Christine Elliott - does she care about open and transparent government?

Dear Christine,

I might be interested in your op-ed if I thought you really cared about holding Kathleen Wynne responsible for the Liberals attack on Freedom of Information in Ontario.

I've repeatedly asked you what you think about what Kathleen Wynne's government did with open and transparent access to government information.

I've also asked you if you became premier, would you repeal this harmful law that hides all abortion information, and its full frontal attack on democracy.

But all I get from you is--silence.

So no Christine, I didn't read your op-ed.

Thank you.

Patricia Maloney

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Pat --

I thought you might be interested in my OpEd running in today’s National Post entitled “Kathleen’s war on jobs.”

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2014/12/10/christine-elliott-kathleen-wynnes-war-on-jobs

I am holding this Wynne government to account and standing-up against her job killing pension plan.

Sincerely,

Christine Elliott 

We shouldn't have to pay for what is hidden

From today's National Post

"That damage [that the Liberal government is in no particular hurry to fix the fiscal mess in Ontario]— which will total almost $300-billion in accumulated provincial debt by the time the books are projected to be balanced — is substantial. Even if there are only smooth economic waters ahead for years to come, Ontario will struggle to compete while weighed down by that millstone. We hope that the province will one day have a government that realizes the enormity of this problem. We suspect it will have to wait at least four more years to get it."

For starters, why don't the Liberals defund abortion? How much money do we spend on abortion in Ontario you ask? Well we still don't know of course.

We do know that the Liberals could have spent as much at $70 million in 2010 on abortion, the last year that we have fairly decent statistics for.

After 2011, it's anyone's guess as to what we spend. Probably a lot more.

As long as the Ontario Liberals continue to hide all abortion related information, we won't know what we're spending.

If the Liberals want to hide that information then we shouldn't have to pay for it.

Freedom of information case

These two articles on my Ontario Freedom of Information case disappeared from the Ottawa Citizen's website. I had hard copies so I scanned them and posted them. They are from 2013.

Which Ontario PC leader supports open transparent gov't?

Dear Christine,

I received your brochure in the mail asking me to support your campaign.

If you hope to make the Conservative Party a party of inclusiveness, you might want to consider including those of us who are fighting for free and unencumbered access to information in Ontario. Right now this is not the case. I can't imagine a single Ontario resident who would be opposed to this right.

I ask you to please let me know where you stand on this issue before I decide whose leadership I will support, and whose leadership I will encourage others to support.

Thank you.

Sincerely,
Patricia Maloney

Violation of freedom of expression rights

Our case in a nutshell

It's that the government, and the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario (IPC), have misinterpreted FIPPA.

Our position is that section 65(5.7) of FIPPA cannot mean a ban on all materials related to the provision of abortion services, but must mean a ban on materials related to the provision of abortion services which contain personal information.

Remember that FIPPA has two goals: to make government documents public, and to protect personal privacy.

The amount of abortions and the cost of those abortions, is not personal information, and so keeping those private, do not match up with the goals of FIPPA.

Section 65(5.7) must then mean, and must have been intended, to cover only materials related to the provision of abortion services which contain personal information. This position supports a constitutional interpretation of FIPPA. Section 2(b) of the Charter protects your right to freedom of expression and freedom of the press.

As a blogger, I benefit from freedom of the press.

In order for me to use my freedom of expression, and comment on issues of public importance, such as abortion and the use of taxpayer dollars, I need access to these documents.

The government and the IPC’s interpretation of section 65(5.7) results in a violation of my freedom of expression. It cannot therefore be a proper interpretation.