Beyond The Commons

 Beyond The Commons

Aaron Wherry covers all the goings-on in and around Parliament Hill. Follow Aaron on Twitter: @aaronwherry

Categories: Beyond The Commons, Capital Read

Better government through datasets

by Aaron Wherry on Thursday, March 17, 2011 1:51pm - 25 Comments

Treasury Board President Stockwell Day has launched the government of Canada’s official open data portal: data.gc.ca.

The Open Data Portal is a one-stop shop for federal Government data, providing data that can be downloaded free of charge. The portal facilitates access to datasets available on websites to citizens, researchers, voluntary organizations and the private sector. Application developers can reuse and mashup the data from the portal for commercial purposes, research, or community services to benefit all Canadians in a variety of ways.

This pilot portal will initially bring together more than 260,000 datasets from the following ten participating departments available to all Canadians: Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada; Citizenship and Immigration Canada; Environment Canada; Department of Finance Canada; Fisheries and Oceans Canada; Library and Archives Canada; Natural Resources Canada; Statistics Canada; Transport Canada; and the Treasury Board Secretariat.

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  • gottabesaid

    I'm not sure if this is as 'open' as it needs to be, but it's certainly a step in the right direction.

    But, ummm… I don't want to get anybody in trouble here, but I think somebody has to revise this sentence:

    "The Open Data Portal is a one-stop shop for federal Government data,"

    to "The Open Data Portal is a one-stop shop for Harper Government data."

    Again, I hope I didn't get somebody in trouble by pointing this out.

    • SanDiegoDave

      It depends really. If the employee is a Victim Of The Liberal Media, then no, he or she will be just fine and can carry on as if nothing happened.

      There does remain the possibility that the employee was an Enemy Of The Harper Government and though acting bravely to undermine the Cause (as the employee saw fit), he or she must nonetheless be made an example of, and be fired quietly and with no fanfare tomorrow (Friday) afternoon.

  • Crit_Reasoning

    Sounds like a worthwhile initiative. To test it out, I searched for data on refugee claims. Here are the top ten source countries for refugee claims in 2009, in descending order:

    Mexico
    Hungary
    Colombia
    China, People's Republic of
    Haiti
    United States of America
    Sri Lanka
    Nigeria
    St. Vincent and the Grenadines
    India

    • s_c_f

      Wow, that is really useful.

      Interesting that Hungary is second. The fact that the US is there is ridiculous

      • Mike T.

        I imagine their claims have a very very low success rate, but as we can't stop people making claims they have to go into the database.

      • John D

        It's not really ridiculous. You have to arrive in a country to make a claim, and obviously it's easier to arrive in Canada from the US.

        • DBM

          There's probably also a certain number of refugees who first land in the USA but subsequently make claims in Canada under the family exemption to the safe third country agreement.

          I imagine Mexico has plumetted as a result of the visa requirement.

    • John D

      Hungary really stands out there – Anyone know the reason for so many claimants?

      • Dot

        Roma

        • John D

          I didn't even know Hungary had a large Roma population – you learn something every day!

      • Crit_Reasoning

        There were 302 claimants from Hungary in 2008, and the number soared to 2,533 in 2009. Canada lifted its visa requirement in 2008. The applications are almost all from Hungary's Roma community.

        More information here: http://www.canadianimmigrant.ca/learn/newsitems/a…

    • gottabesaid

      Did you know the operating profit margin for movie theatres rose from 8.8 per cent in 2006 to 11.9 per cent in 2009. It's a fact!
      http://www40.statcan.gc.ca/l01/cst01/arts65a-eng….

      • TimesArrow

        Could you go back and find out who put the NOT in Oda's document?…sorry…i have to walk the dogs. I'll check back in a bit ok?

    • Dot

      Try this question:

      "Its largest airport was named for a World War II hero; its second largest, for a World War II battle."

      Elementary.

  • SanDiegoDave

    Interesting. Now, considering the Harper ™ Government is gutting Stats Can (as they are not True Believers), would all the data in this databank be somewhat useless in a couple of years?

    • Crit_Reasoning

      How is Statistics Canada being gutted, exactly? Please elaborate.

      • SanDiegoDave

        I was exaggerating.

        Sigh.

        I have met the enemy, and he is me.

    • s_c_f

      No.

  • Guest

    That sound you hear is stats nerd across the country squealing with delight.

    • John D

      Data nerds. The worst kind ;)

  • Dot

    "The Government of Canada is launching its Open Data Portal to make a large amount of data accessible through a single window," said Minister Day.

    Hey, I thought it was the Harper Government. Now we know why Stockwell is quitting. Even that's a tough one for him to utter.

  • OriginalEmily1

    But Census data is a no-no.

    Very. Confused. Govt.

    • John D

      It all fits together:

      Step 1: Make all data openly available.
      Step 2: *GASP* We can't ask people to provide [Data X] for all the world to see!
      Step 3: Must stop collecting [Data X].

  • John D

    badumching

  • http://blog.buzzdata.com Pete Forde

    One of the most embarrassing aspects of this project is that it was developed in secrecy without any public input.

    Specifically, the site has 260k data POINTS, not datasets. There's actually only a few hundred datasets on the site, which is kind of a significant order of magnitude difference. Perhaps if they'd asked for help we could have set them straight on the difference?
    http://blog.buzzdata.com/post/4064271422/data-gc-…

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