What every citizen of BC should know about the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act is that at the end, it has a section that essentially argues that *any* and *all* government information *must* be disclosed if it is in the public interest.

“Division 4 -- Public Interest Paramount”

It has just one Section:

*Information must be disclosed if in the public interest*

25 (1)Whether or not a request for access is made, the head of a public body must, without delay, disclose to the public, to an affected group of people or to an applicant, information

(a)about a risk of significant harm to the environment or to the health or safety of the public or a group of people, or

(b)the disclosure of which is, for any other reason, clearly in the public interest.

(2)Subsection (1) applies despite any other provision of this Act.
———

https://www.bclaws.gov.bc.ca/civix/document/id/complete/statreg/96165_02#section25

#BCPoli #BCGov #IslandRail #FOIPPA #FOI

Just sent a truly epic email to the Freedom of Information office at the BC Ministry requesting that they release a bunch of information that they refused/redacted in my 2000 page Island Railway related information disclosure.

It was 1160 words with 11 attachments. 😂

Feeling my citizen-power rn

Though i don't envy the FOI analyst opening that up just before lunch on a Friday in June. 😇

(blog post about the FOI request: (https://chrisalemany.ca/2025/06/16/2-years-later-my-freedom-of-information-request-shows-a-snapshot-of-government-ignoring-vancouver-islanders-for-20-years/)
#BCPoli #BCGov #IslandRail #FOIPPA #FOI

Aaaaand... I just got an email from the government FOI team predictably asking for its legislated time extension to complete my request. The extension will stretch their response out to as long as November 10. I expect to receive a response on November 10 at 3PM. 😆

There should really be a requirement for the responding agency to 'show their work’ and prove that they aren't just responding to requests at the latest moment, rather than legitimately trying to complete the request in the original 30 days allotted.

I love that it says “in limited circumstances”... the time limit may be extended. Weird how common those “limited circumstances” are. I can't remember a request where they didn't ask for an extension.
#BCPoli #Railway #ClimateChange #ClimateEmergency #VancouverIsland #BCHwy4 #BCHwy1 #Malahat #FOI #ATIA #FOIPPA #Information