Digging for dirt on the CBC
By Martin Patriquin - Monday, December 20, 2010 - 83 Comments
Michel Drapeau has asked for information from the CBC that its top brass says no one deserves to know. Are they right?
Photograph by Blair Gable; Pawel Dwulit/CP
Michel Drapeau considers himself an equal-opportunity provocateur. Since 1994, the lawyer and retired colonel has filed over 5,000 access to information requests to just about every single ministry, agency and authority within the federal government, from the Royal Mint to National Defence, for hundreds of clients—including nearly every federal political party in the country. His work helped uncover some of the more gruesome details of Canada’s mission in Somalia, which ultimately saw the disbanding of the Canadian Airborne Regiment. He is also the reason former chief of defence staff and ambassador John de Chastelain’s penchant for $285 bottles of wine is a matter of public record.
Today, Drapeau’s knack for writing access to information requests is testing the exclusion that allows the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to withhold sensitive and potentially compromising information concerning many of its core endeavours, including how its spends much of its $1-billion yearly allotment from the federal government. As well, his probe into the CBC—a “forensic examination,” as the 77-year-old calls it—is apparently fuelling a feud between the public broadcaster and Quebecor, one of the country’s largest media companies and the CBC’s chief French-language competitor.
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'The issue will not go away'
By Aaron Wherry - Friday, November 27, 2009 at 12:48 PM - 15 Comments
Three important dispatches from Embassy magazine this week. Laura Payton on the plight of the whistleblower. Lee Berthiaume talks to the Information Commissioner about the paper trail, or lack thereof. And retired colonel Michel Drapeau argues passionately for a public inquiry.
Instead of being concerned with Canada’s reputation among the community of nations, the government appears to be more interested in displaying unbridled partisanship than statesmanship. However, whether a public inquiry is called by government over the next weeks or so, one thing is certain: This issue will not go away.
What is also certain is that both the parliamentary committee and the media will chip away at the story, a story which ministers of the Crown seem to be attempting to paper over. However, I am a believer in the inevitability of the truth surfacing sooner or later and in the rule of law.
The whole kernel might as well come out in a judicial manner, where partisanship will recede to the world of twitters. That would be best for Canada and its government, our armed forces and, of course, our gallant, valiant and brave men and women serving in the military. This is crucial so that they may complete their difficult and perilous mission in peace, honour, respect and affection of the nation, for they and their families, having served through blood, sweat and tears, have made enough sacrifices for the good of the nation.
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Access to Information wants to be free. From Robert Marleau.
By kadyomalley - Wednesday, June 11, 2008 at 1:27 PM - 0 Comments
Wells has the full story on the soon-to-be-infamous Drapeau letter, in which the retired…
Wells has the full story on the soon-to-be-infamous Drapeau letter, in which the retired colonel has a few home truths for Information Commissioner Robert Marleau, whose ‘triage’ approach to dealing with priority requests “is offensive to the very notion that the access right is quasi-constitutional in nature.”
