Martin’s point is a good one. Canada’s professors and intellectuals have been oddly quiet on the scandals plaguing multiple levels of government, or the abuse of evidence and science in Canada today. But for me, the strangest silence has to do with the attacks on the central institution of Canadian academic and intellectual life – the university.

The attacks take many forms. On the one hand, the persistent (and debunked) austerity agenda has seen governments slowly starve universities of needed funds, while at the same time pushing them to grow. On the other, a growing cadre of pundits are questioning the relevance of a university education, claiming that our higher education institutions are out-of-touch, out-of-sync, and out-of-style. Together, these trends are pushing a faddish devotion to empty buzz-phrases like the “skills gap” and an irrational exuberance for untested and half-formed technologies, like massively open online courses (MOOCs).

If allowed to continue unchallenged, under-funding, narrow “job training only” focus, and technological solutionism threaten to undermine the diverse missions of our universities and the many public goods they produce. This is as close to an existential threat that Canada’s universities have ever faced, and yet those who call the universities home – the academics – have yet to challenge these destructive trends. Faculty members are justifiably focused on their research and teaching, and engaged in the life of their disciplines and fields. But unless they can also turn their attention outward to engage with both the critics and the wider society, the universities they love may be stolen out from under them.

It’s time to speak out. The stakes are too high to stay silent.

The sessions were quite good, featuring a lot of insight for student affairs professionals and those interested in teaching a learning. However, as with past years, there could  be more sessions focusing on the public policy dimensions of higher ed.

Not that there were no policy-focused sessions. Nobina Robinson, CEO of Polytechnics Canada, presented a keynote on “The emerging third sector in Canadian higher education: The case for polytechnic education.” While it made some interesting points, the presentation did not provide a critical or evidence-based perspective on the need for polytechnic institutions, and at times felt more like a PR pitch. A session organized by the Centre for Higher Education Research and Development (CHERD) provided a useful overview of the challenges facing universities in Canada, but did so from an administrative viewpoint. Little attempt was made to examine the underlying trends in public finance and politics that have conspired to put universities in a difficult position.

Given the increasing importance of higher education in contemporary policy debates, it is vital that the CSSHE and its members turn their analytical and critical attention to current trends in public policy. We need to understand why institutions are attracting greater public and political attention, and how this attention is creating pressure for change and reform. Are these changes positive? Who benefits? What are the potential downstream effects of proposed reforms and the ongoing austerity narrative in public policy? These are important questions, and CSSHE has an central role to play in providing real answers for policymakers and the public.

The CSSHE, and the academics it represents, has an opportunity to position itself as a leader in understanding the “big picture” of higher education in Canada and around the world. It already does an excellent job on the micro-level issues in higher ed, such as teaching, learning, student support, and institutional governance. A stronger policy focus would strengthen the annual conference greatly, and provide needed context and analysis on rather urgent policy discussions.

But even though we didn’t, the micro-lecture roundtable discussion sponsored jointly by the Canadian Political Science Association (CPSA) and the Canadian Historical Association (CHA) provided a perfect venue for scholars in a range of fields to address some of the themes that were raised in the most recent issue of Academic Matters. And it would seem this is a topic that piques people’s interest and incites serious concern for academics – attendees at the roundtable spilled out from the packed room and into the hallway, eager to continue the conversation.

The CPSA/CHA roundtable, titled “Canadian History Under Harper: Federal Identity Initiatives in Conservative Canada,” brought together ten well-respected Canadian historians and political scientists from across the country who spoke to some of the issues raised in Academic Matters and beyond.

As the ten panelists highlighted, the Harper government’s offenses aren’t limited to the silencing of federal scientists, the elimination of the long-form census, the imposition of a strict federal code of conduct on federal librarians, and the elimination of the only reliable source of data on faculty in Canada- all of which we explore in the latest issue of our magazine.

Roundtable participants spoke to all of these issues. But they also spoke about the Harper government’s attempts to rewrite Canadian history in a way that highlights British heritage (but that minimizes any mention of colonialism) and the military. They spoke about a general dumbing down of Canadian society, whereby we not only have less access to good data but we have fewer opportunities to engage in respectful and well-informed dialogue with each other as citizens about issues of public concern. And they spoke about the internal incoherence of a lot of these initiatives as part of a political agenda.

And as UVic political scientist Avigail Eisenberg pointed out, there’s nothing new about governments attempting to manipulate our public institutions and the symbols of our history to their own political advantage. But what’s disconcerting about our current circumstances is the weakening of the institutional supports that would allow for the mobilization of civil society groups to resist these state initiatives.

Despite all the doom and gloom though, there was a call to action for academics to participate in discussions in the public sphere in order to fight back in the apparent war on knowledge.

So to the academics reading this: go forth and participate in public dialogue!

When it comes to the conversation about skills training and post-secondary education, though, the folks at the Conference Board of Canada are trying to make things easier by providing us with a clear but intentionally broad definition of what is meant by skills: “A skilled person is a person who, through education, training and experience, makes a useful contribution to the economy and society.”

On Monday, June 2, 2013, the AGM of the Canadian Society for the Study of Higher Education (CSSHE) heard from Dr. Carl Amrhein on this very topic. Dr. Amrhein, on leave from his position as Provost and Vice-President Academic at the University of Alberta, is working with the Conference Board of Canada to undertake a long-term initiative that will examine the skills and post-secondary education challenges that Canada is facing. And on June 3, Dr. Michael Bloom, Vice-President Organizational Effectiveness and Learning with the Conference Board of Canada joined Dr. Amrhein for a rolling dialogue on the same topic at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences in Victoria.

Through these discussions, we heard that like many governments worldwide, the Government of Canada wants post-secondary education to align with their skills agenda. But as a result of our constitutional particularities, there is no coordinated national conversation about post-secondary education and skills. We heard the familiar story of governments expecting universities to expand their mandates without any commensurate increase in funding – in fact, in the face of government deficits, the prospect of funding cuts is very real. We heard that the world is moving toward a more coordinated, national approach to post-secondary education and if Canada doesn’t do the same we will lose ground.

Using the above definition of skills as their starting point, the Conference Board of Canada has set out to initiate a national dialogue and research program that will lead to the development of a skills and post-secondary education strategy in Canada. Through this initiative, they hope to make Canadian post-secondary education into a more coordinated national system through institutional and organizational changes.

The Conference Board of Canada will soon be releasing a paper that outlines their skills and post-secondary education project and higher education stakeholders will be invited to contribute to the conversation.

But the big stats don’t stop there – 1,800 sessions, 500 volunteers, and 70 academic associations are all part of Congress 2013 at the beautiful University of Victoria. Academic Matters is here to experience the discussions, share our new issues, and as always, scout for new writing talent.

Besides the quality of the individual sessions, a big highlight so far has been UVic itself. The university has done a great job as host, with a great campus, friendly volunteers, and an outstanding program of cultural events featuring local First Nations. Kudso also to the “Big Think” lecture series sponsored by UVic, the AUCC, and the Canadian Foundation for Innovation. Once I’m done typing out this post, I’ll be off to hear the Globe and Mail’s Doug Saunders speak about his new book, The Myth of the Muslim Tide. Later in the day, McGill professor – and Academic Matters contributor - Daniel Weinstock will be speaking on philosophy and public policy.

And, of course, there’s the ScholarSIP (see what they did there?) beer tent provided by the Vancouver Island Brewery.

We’ve also learned that the Conference Board of Canada is planning a new research project into the future of higher education in Canada. AM Assoicate Editor Erica Rayment will be writing on this new project, so stay tuned for more information.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s time for more coffee.

The truth is that academia is under attack. Not by a single aggressor, nor made with a singular objective, but the attack is very real. Scientific evidence is derided and dismissed. Institutions charged with researching controversial topics are denied critical funds. Governments stop collecting the data needed to support informed policy decisions. And almost every day, some newspaper or another will run an Op-Ed questioning the utility of universities, the relevance of their work, and whether we even need them at all. Research? Inquiry? Critical thought? No thanks, say the critics; all we want our universities to train the next generation of workers.

Some of the attacks are driven by the so-called austerity agenda—in an age of public restraint, some believe we can no longer afford “luxuries” like basic research and the humanities. Other attacks are the result of political expediency, where facts and academic freedom are an inconvenient impediment to the goals of certain politicians or well-funded lobbyists. Still others come from a desire to change the (albeit tenuous) public nature of our institutions, to open higher education to markets and put them at the service of private interests.

No matter the motivation, all of this adds up to something that looks very much like a war on knowledge. Both the institutions and substance of academia are being pressured in unprecedented ways. Citizens, students, professors, and academic librarians are all unwilling combatants in this fight, but it is one that they can’t turn away from. We need data, facts, ideas, theories, and knowledge— not to mention the institutions that sustain them—to feed our democracy, to make informed decisions about public policy, and to solve the urgent and complex challenges we face.

This issue of Academic Matters has explored some of the elements of this war on knowledge. Carol Linnitt reviews the Harper Government’s attempts to muzzle federal scientists and shut down climate change research, while Myron Groover examines the stifling new Code of Conduct at Library and Archives Canada. Munir A. Sheikh looks at how the cancellation of the long-form census will affect our ability to make informed public policy decisions. Also on the Statistics Canada front, Felice Martinello laments the loss of the University and College Academic Staff System (UCASS) database, a trusted source of salary data used by both university administrators and faculty associations in collective bargaining. Ontario’s Information and Privacy Commissioner, Ann Cavoukian— whose office exists in part to defend access to information and knowledge— calls for public organizations to release information as a matter of course, not just by request, in order to improve accountability and transparency. Finally, Aaron Bady looks at how the hype behind Massively Open Online Courses (MOOCs) obscures a push to obscure the public goods of universities and privatize higher education.

Worrying stuff, but our contributors also offer solutions. They call for us to join the protest against attempts to muzzle, starve, or dismiss knowledge and knowledge institutions. Others argue that a truly open approach to data is needed to improve the health of our democracy. Knowledge can also be defended by giving our research organizations true independence from government, or to replace lost datasets with new collaborative arrangements. The battle is not lost; if we act now, we can help keep knowledge at the heart of public life.

This issue of Academic Matters has particular resonance, as it will be distributed at the 2013 Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences in Victoria, BC. If you’re reading this at the conference, take note: many aspects of the war on knowledge are aimed squarely at the disciplines you work in. And what better place to talk about our response to the attacks, than at a conference dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge?

We also know that many readers will not share our assessment, or have a different take on the issues we’ve explored in these pages. Please take the time to send us your thoughts in a letter or as a comment here on our website. If there’s one thing that open, unfettered knowledge supports, it’s reasoned debate.

As always, thanks for reading.

Graeme Stewart is the Editor-in-Chief of Academic Matters, Communications Manager for the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations, and a PhD student at the University of Toronto.

What is important here is not the outcome, but the nature of the process that underscored the RFA arbitration. This process was able to function because both sides had access to data on faculty salaries and other faculty characteristics that they used to make reasoned, evidence-based arguments about the salary increases that faculty should or should not receive. This kind of process, however, will be much more difficult to follow in the future. In early 2012, Statistics Canada announced that it had discontinued the University and College Academic Staff System (UCASS) survey, which up until then was the most accurate and comprehensive set of data on faculty in Canada. Both the Ryerson administration and faculty association had used the UCASS data to make their arguments in 2005. Future negotiations will no longer be able to rely on this crucial data set. The last round of data released from the UCASS survey covered the 2010-11 academic year and are therefore already out of date for any current or future negotiations.

UCASS was an incredibly important resource for the entire university sector, providing reliable and comprehensive data that made crucial research and analysis possible. The UCASS survey required all Canadian universities to submit data on their full time faculty by October of every year. The institutions were required to submit, among other things, data on the age, rank, gender, subject taught, year of appointment, and years since last promotion for every full-time faculty member. It also included information on faculty salaries and any administrative stipends paid. Statistics Canada worked with the universities to reconcile differences in definitions or faculty classifications across universities and resolve any other difficulties that might compromise the quality of the data. The result was a dataset that could be used to produce meaningful profiles of faculty characteristics and salaries that allowed for useful comparisons across schools. Perhaps most importantly, the fact that the survey was conducted by Statistics Canada provided two important benefits. First, it meant that universities were legally required to submit accurate and complete faculty data. Second, it meant that the output was seen as impartial by both faculty and administrators because the data were collected by a neutral third party.

While the data collected by Statistics Canada for the UCASS survey were indeed crucially important and used extensively, in practice the system was not perfect. For example, many universities failed to meet the October submission deadline, often by several months, which meant their data were unavailable and any attempted salary comparisons suffered as a result. Further, the official Statistics Canada hard-copy publication of the data, Salaries and Salary Scales of Full-time Teaching Staff at Canadian Universities was not itself terribly helpful for collective bargaining or other research on faculty. Average and median faculty salaries were reported by rank, but there was no information on levels of experience or any other faculty characteristics, and the publication included a confusing set of categories and exclusions. In practice, faculty associations needed to work with the raw dataset; something that was not available publicly and often exceeded the in-house capabilities of faculty association bargaining teams.

The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) and the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations (OCUFA), however, filled in some of the gaps left by the Salary Scales publication and provided useful data for collective bargaining. Both organizations obtained custom compilations of the Statistics Canada data and made them available to member faculty associations. The CAUT compilation included data on faculty age, rank, responsibilities, and average and median salaries for Canadian universities. The OCUFA compilation reported similar breakdowns of the data but only for faculty at Ontario universities. More recent OCUFA compilations also included tables covering subject taught, promotions, and detailed measures of experience. Both the OCUFA and CAUT compilations were aggregated and randomized to maintain the confidentiality of faculty. This made analysis of the data more challenging, but it was still possible to extract good information from their data tables.

University administrations would also obtain their own custom compilations of the UCASS data from Statistics Canada. Unfortunately, their compilations often specified different parameters, inclusions, and exclusions than either the OCUFA or CAUT releases. The differences between the compilations, combined with the randomization and aggregation of the OCUFA and CAUT runs, often led to discrepancies about salary comparisons. But, despite these differences, the data provided an important, mutually agreed-upon factual basis that was used to resolve conflicts at the bargaining table.

Beyond the context of collective bargaining, the UCASS data were also used by a variety of researchers interested in Canadian higher education. Researchers can access the raw, unaggregated data on individual faculty members, for the years that the survey was conducted, by submitting specific project proposals to Statistics Canada. If the project is approved, researchers can only access the data from specific Statistics Canada sites and all output has to be vetted by Statistics Canada staff to maintain confidentiality. The unaggregated data on individual faculty members allow more detailed and complex examinations of all aspects of faculty covered by the dataset. For example, data on the age profiles of faculty have been used to predict faculty retirements. The retirement predictions are then paired with future enrolment projections to consider faculty requirements and future hiring needs. Other work has used the UCASS data to estimate the effects of the changes in mandatory retirement laws on faculty retirement decisions.

The data also allow a close examination of the status of women within academe. Several papers compare the salaries of men and women faculty and track the changes in the salary differential over time. See , for example, Warman, Woolley and Worswick’s 2010 paper on the evolution of gendered pay differentials at Canadian universities. Another line of inquiry compares differences in time to promotion for men and women faculty, as in Stewart, Ornstein and Drakich (2009). My own work used the UCASS data from OCUFA and CAUT to look at the relationship between university revenues and faculty salaries and the effects of unionization versus special plan arrangements in Ontario.

Now that the UCASS survey has been cancelled, however, we will no longer be able to track the progress of women academics, predict faculty age distributions and retirements, or examine the composition of faculty and faculty salaries by subject, age, gender, or rank. It will be much more difficult for faculty associations to identify groups within their memberships who require extra attention (e.g. junior faculty) and to present compelling arguments, both to the university administrations and to the other faculty association members, that special provisions are required to help them (e.g. lump sum versus percentage salary increases). More importantly for collective bargaining, there will no longer be a mutually agreed-upon pool of information about faculty characteristics and salaries that may help identify settlements that are acceptable both to university administrations and faculty associations. University administrations will surely argue that faculty are already well compensated compared to faculty at other schools. Faculty associations will likewise argue that faculty should receive salary increases. Without the data, however, the arguments will be far less credible. Neither group will be able to convince the other side without a comprehensive and credible source of evidence. As a result, it will be much more difficult to make progress in collective bargaining.

Without the UCASS data set, there are no other comprehensive sources of data on faculty in Canada. For Ontario universities and faculty associations, salaries published under the Public Sector Salary Disclosure Act provide a starting point for faculty salary data, but this source has significant limitations. The names and salaries of all broader public sector employees—including those at universities— who earn $100,000 or more are posted on a provincial government website commonly known as the Sunshine List. The data can be downloaded and parsed to make salary comparisons, but it requires a significant amount of effort. Some researchers have used data from the Sunshine List to study trends in administrators’ salaries; determinants of faculty salaries and their relation to the migration of faculty; and whether salary disclosure discouraged the growth of senior administrators’ salaries, or encouraged their growth by enabling more comparisons across institutions. The fundamental difficulty is, of course, that the disclosure only reports salary data for faculty who earn $100,000 or more, which leaves many faculty uncounted and unavailable for analysis. Researchers have struggled with this limitation. Given current salaries, nearly half of Ontario’s faculty are excluded. This is particularly true for sessional or contract faculty. For collective bargaining purposes, it is possible to make an assumption about the distribution of salaries based on earlier data and impute the missing salaries. But I doubt that the results would be convincing at the bargaining table.

A preferable option would be for all of the interested parties—primarily faculty associations and administrators across Canada—to get together and create a dataset of faculty characteristics and salaries that is roughly equivalent to UCASS. There are clearly benefits for both university administrations and faculty associations and, in theory, it should not be difficult to do. All universities use the same information on faculty members for their everyday human resources responsibilities, so the data are already easily accessible to universities and in common formats. In fact, most administrations already provide copies of these data to their faculty associations on a regular basis. Confidentiality would not be a serious obstacle since, again, the data are already provided to faculty associations and more than half of Ontario faculty already have their salaries published under the Public Sector Salary Disclosure Act. The data could easily be aggregated in a manner similar to Statistics Canada’s process, to preserve confidentiality if or when it is required. Aggregated data does make analysis more difficult since it contains less information than the raw data, but it would still be very useful to university administrations and faculty associations for salary comparisons and other analyses.

Data on faculty characteristics and salaries will only be useful if both university administrations and faculty associations believe it is credible and trustworthy. With Statistics Canada no longer collecting the data, both university administrations and faculty associations need to be included as equal partners in the creation, maintenance, and dissemination of the data set in order to promote confidence and trust. In Ontario, a partnership between the Council of Ontario Universities (COU), which represents university administrations, and OCUFA, which represents faculty associations, could be established to collect, process, and disseminate data. Given the existing institutional structures and functions it would not be difficult nor expensive. It would also create benefits at the bargaining table, and in our overall ability to understand higher education in Ontario.

In a better world, Statistics Canada would be given the mandate and funding required to continue conducting the UCASS data survey, the long-form census, and the other discontinued surveys that will be sorely missed. UCASS provided the best vehicle for impartial, high-quality data on faculty. In its absence, faculty and administrators are left to piece together a second-best solution.

Felice Martinello is a Professor of Economics at Brock University.

References

Stewart, P., Ornstein, M., Drakich, J. (2009). Gender and Promotion at Canadian Universities. Canadian Review of Sociology  46 (1),  59–85.

Warman, C., Woolley, F., & Worswick, C. (2010). The evolution of male-female earnings differentials in Canadian universities,1970–2001. Canadian Journal of Economics  43(1), 347–72.

Since then, Ontario has made many significant strides in the direction of greater transparency and accountability. This includes measurable improvements to the province’s access to information regime established by FIPPA and MFIPPA . Similar to other freedom of information legislation, these Acts require government organizations to make a decision about an access to information request within 30 days. Back when I first became Commissioner in 1997, the number of requests that were being responded to within that 30-day period was unacceptably low, at around 48 per cent. However, through the hard work of my office and the increasing acceptance of FOI by Ontario’s public servants, that response rate has risen to an average of over 80 per cent. I admit that this is not perfect; however, some requests are complex and may require an extension based on the nature of the request. Nevertheless, real progress has been made in Ontario with a growing and demonstrable appreciation by our public institutions for the importance of an access to information regime.

My office has pushed for greater response rates to FOI requests, and to have more and more organizations covered by the Acts. As far back as 1994, my office submitted proposed changes to Ontario’s Legislature calling on the government to extend access laws to cover a wider set of public organizations in order to make them more accountable to the public. In 2003, Ontario’s energy utilities, Hydro One and Power Generation, were brought under FIPPA . Ontario’s universities were finally placed under FIPPA in 2006. And in 2012, Ontario became the last province in Canada to bring its hospitals under freedom of information legislation, giving citizens the right to make a request for access to a range of general records.

However, the evolution of FOI in Ontario is not simply a question of improving response rates and increasing coverage of public institutions. Indeed, the concept of the public’s right to know now extends far beyond the requirements of FIPPA and MFIPPA . For over two decades I have been repeatedly calling on our government to make itself more transparent and accessible in response to the public’s growing expectations for access to government-held information. And there has been some success—for example, it is now a requirement for Ontario’s ministers and senior civil servants to proactively disclose their expenses. A number of municipalities in Ontario and other government agencies have also adopted this practice and proactively post their expenditures on their websites.

My office has been dealing with the issue of proactive disclosure and open government since it first opened its doors in 1987. However, a lot has changed since then, namely the advances in information and communications technology that we now call the Internet. It is certainly much easier to disseminate government information now than when I first started at the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario (IPC). The dominant practice now, as in the past, is known as Routine Disclosure, whereby access to general records was granted on a routine basis as the result of a specific request. However, I feel that we are entering an age where Routine Disclosure will soon be a thing of the past. New technologies are ushering in an era that will allow for Automatic Disclosure to be the norm, and not the exception.

Further, I believe that governments are beginning to recognize that public sector information is a public resource with valuable economic and social benefits that can make positive contributions to a healthier economy, society and democracy.

As every year passes, more and more jurisdictions around the world are moving towards “Open Data”—an initiative that began with the idea that certain types of non-personal government-held information should be made freely available to everyone to use and republish. The ubiquity of the Web and accompanying technologies has driven dramatic new increases in public demand for government-held information, providing a new dimension to civic participation, and redefining the significance of freedom of information legislation.

With so much data now available, and in so many different formats, individuals, community groups, and researchers have the power to use public information for a variety of purposes—for example, to spot inefficiencies in government services, and make recommendations directly to the offices responsible for those services. Our economy also benefits by giving businesses access to a wealth of new information from which to improve or create new products and services. There is now the potential to create entire new industries and economies where none existed before. Just one example is the rapid growth of applications, better known as “apps.” People can now download apps onto their mobile devices that utilize government information such as public transit schedules, traffic reports, flu maps, and health inspector restaurant reviews, just to name a few.

Around the world, a number of governments have joined the Open Data movement to take advantage of the economic and social benefits. In the United States, President Obama has ordered government officials to release more information to improve the amount and quality of data offered online, in addition to requiring every government agency to provide at least three datasets of high quality value. The results in the United States are commendable, with Data.gov offering thousands of datasets which can be put to use by individuals and businesses alike. The United Kingdom has also embraced Open Data with their Data.Gov.UK website which also offers hundreds of datasets and a substantial offering of apps.

The Government of Ontario joined the Open Data movement in 2012, with its own Ontario Open Data website as part of its commitment to a more open government with an array of datasets covering topics such as transportation, infrastructure projects, and tourism. There are also a number of municipalities in Ontario featuring Open Data portals, with the City of Toronto setting a world-class example. The Toronto Open Data site is a clean and efficient one-stop website where anyone can find and download datasets that cover an unbelievable amount of information covering almost every subject matter relevant to the city. By eliminating the practice of Routine or Reactive Disclosure, the City not only provides service to its citizens and industry in the form of valuable information, it also saves time and money in the process—truly a win-win scenario.

Being in a unique position where I serve as both the Information and Privacy Commissioner, I am often asked whether I find a conflict in what appears to be a contradictory situation—having to defend the right to privacy while ensuring the right to access and freedom of information. The answer to that question is, simply, no. In the former, you hold the data back and let the individual decide what to release; in the latter you push it out the door.

Privacy and access are not in conflict, they are complimentary to each other. Both guarantee the fundamental freedoms that we enjoy in our free and democratic societies: the right to hold our governments accountable and the right to preserve our privacy. That is why free societies around the world seek to protect both. This is exemplified by the statutes that I oversee in my jurisdiction, which play the dual role of providing a right of access to information under the control of government organizations while equally protecting personally identifiable information and providing individuals with a right of access to their own personal information.

While I would be among the first to sing the praises of Open Data, we must also acknowledge that Open Data has hazards and pitfalls that need to be addressed, namely the protection of individual privacy. If personal information is not respected and protected by jurisdictions implementing Open Data programs, those programs will suffer. A prime example is a story that is now well known. Near the end of 2012, the Journal News in New York published a map showing the home addresses and names of handgun owners in two New York counties using data acquired from government sources. In retaliation, a lawyer in Connecticut published the addresses and phone numbers of the newspaper’s staff. To make matters worse, it was later discovered that much of the information used to identify gun owners was found to be inaccurate or outdated. These experiences, as well as being traumatic for those involved directly, can undermine public support for Open Data.

This story contains a very clear message for government. It is of course understandable that law enforcement agencies should want to collect personal information on gun permit holders. However, this data is not collected in order to create a public database, and should not be used for that purpose. Not all data should be free and open, especially if it is associated with personally identifiable individuals. We need to distinguish clearly between data that is useful for the public and presents few privacy risks, and data that should be considered private and subject to restrictions. Such clarity is needed before potential confusion grows and brings unnecessary challenges to the protection of privacy and to the growth of Open Data.

Despite these potential challenges, the concept of Open Data has such merit that it inspired me to create Access by Design (AbD)—a concept that encourages public institutions to take a proactive approach to releasing government-held information.

I see the concept and principles of AbD as the next logical progression for governments looking towards the disclosure of government-held information and moving into the future of Open Data.

Privacy by Design (PbD), a concept now considered an international standard in privacy protection, embeds privacy into the design and operation of information technologies and systems. In other words, it addresses the privacy issue in the development process of a policy or program, rather than as an afterthought or after-the-fact addition. AbD is the flip side of that very same concept. Governments should always be taking a more proactive approach to disclosure, but AbD embraces much more than simple proactivity. It calls for a more responsive and efficient government that engages in collaborative relationships with individual citizens, the private sector, and other public institutions.

The first principle of AbD is, naturally, to be proactive and not reactive. Although it is important to have a formal access-to-information regime governed by clear rules, it can be a slow and cumbersome process. It can also be used by some organizations to delay the release of data. Instead, the formal access-to-information regime should be reserved for those situations where government has a legitimate and legislatively recognized reason for withholding information, while data openness is the default.

The second principle is what I call Making Access Truly Accessible. Simply releasing more data is not enough. AbD requires that public information be easily found, indexed, and presented in user-friendly formats. The point of the exercise is not to bury people in information—it has to be formatted in a way that makes it truly accessible. There is little value in proactively disclosing public information if it is quietly placed online in obscure locations, using uncommon software, and to which very few people have access.

This leads me to the third principle: Quality of Information. There is very little value in gaining access to poor quality data. Information has been called the lifeblood of the 21st century. This is particularly true when it comes to meaningful citizen participation in public life. Not only is it essential for government institutions to place public data in public databases, they must also ensure that the information is accurate, reliable, and current. Quality control and assurance protocols are vital to ensure that public participation in our society remains possible and relevant.

While privacy is not a central principle in AbD, it is still critical in the application of AbD. When governments are designing new data sets or programs, consideration should be given at the conceptual stage to how privacy will be protected in any access to information regime. Rather than approaching privacy and access as an issue to be dealt with down the road— perhaps in response to FOI requests—governments should be looking at what information they are collecting and how they can effectively make it available to the public without compromising privacy. By building privacy and access into programs at the beginning, we can achieve the greatest benefits of open government and Open Data.

The advent of the Internet has brought explosive growth in the amount of information available to the average citizen. While formal freedom of information regimes remain relevant, they are no longer sufficient as the primary means of managing government-held information. Public institutions need to accept the fact that public expectations surrounding access to information will never be the same. Our governments need to embrace the new culture of Open Data by making data readily available to the public as part of the social contract to serve their citizens. Transparency and access to information are vital components of a free and functioning democracy. Citizens must be ensured the right to government-held information in order to participate meaningfully in civic life—something that is not possible if government activities are shielded from public view. Scholars must be able to access government data to critique current activities and design the evidence-based policies of the future. When information is freely available, citizens and researchers alike can question the actions of their government and participate meaningfully in policy decisions. Transparency creates a culture of accountability, and accountable government is the very foundation upon which our free and open society is built.

Ann Cavoukian is the Information and Privacy Commissioner for Ontario.

Where is the hype coming from? On the one hand, higher education is ripe for “disruption”—to use Clayton Christensen’s theory of “disruptive innovation”—because there is a real, systemic crisis in higher education, one that offers no apparent or immanent solution. It’s hard to imagine how the status quo can survive if you extend current trends forward into the future: how does higher education as we know it continue if tuition fees and student debt continue to skyrocket while state funding continues to plunge? At what point does the system simply break down? Something has to give.

At the same time, the speed at which an obscure form of non-credit-based online pedagogy has gone so massively mainstream demonstrates the level of investment that a variety of powerful people and institutions have made in it. The MOOC revolution, if it comes, will not be the result of a groundswell of dissatisfaction felicitously finding a technology that naturally solves problems, nor some version of the market’s invisible hand. It’s a tsunami powered by the interested speculation of interested parties in a particular industry. MOOCs are, and will be, big business, and the way that their makers see profitability at the end of the tunnel is what gives them their particular shape.

After all, when the term itself was coined in 2008— MOOC, for Massively Open Online Course—it described a rather different kind of project. Dave Cormier suggested the name for an experiment in open courseware that George Siemens and Stephen Downes were putting together at the University of Manitoba, a class of 25 students that was opened up to over 1,500 online participants. The tsunami that made land in 2012 bears almost no resemblance to that relatively small—and very differently organized—effort at a blended classroom. For Cormier, Siemens, and Downes, the first MOOC was part of a long-running engagement with connectivist principles of education, the idea that we learn best when we learn collaboratively, in networks, because the process of learning is less about acquiring new knowledge “content” than about building the social and neural connections that will allow that knowledge to circulate, be used, and to grow. This first MOOC was anchored by what Dave Cormier has called “eventedness”—the fact that it was a project shared among participants, within a definable space and time—but its outcomes were to be fluid and open-ended by design. The goal was to create an educational process that would be as exploratory and creative as its participants chose to make it. More importantly, it was about building a sense of community investment in a particular project, a fundamentally socially-driven enterprise.

The MOOCs that emerged in 2012 look very different, starting with their central narratives of “disruption” and “un-bundling.” Instead of building networks, the neoliberal MOOC is driven by a desire to liberate and empower the individual, breaking apart actually-existing academic communities and refocusing on the individual’s acquisition of knowledge. The MOOCs being praised by utopian technologists in the New York Times appear to be the diametric opposite of what Siemens, Downes, and Cormier said they were trying to create, even if they deploy some of the same idealistic rhetoric. Traditional courses seek to transfer content from expert to student in a lecture or seminar setting. The original MOOCs stemmed from a connectivist desire to decentralize and de-institutionalize the traditional model, creating fundamentally open and open-ended networks of circulation and collaboration. In contrast, the MOOCs which are now being developed by Silicon Valley startups Udacity and Coursera, as well as by non-profit initiatives like edX, aim to do exactly the same thing that traditional courses have always done—transfer course content from expert to student—only to do so massively more cheaply and on a much larger scale. Far from de-institutionalizing education or making learning less hierarchical, some of the most prestigious institutions of higher learning in the world are treating the MOOC as a lifeline in troubled economic waters, leveraging “super-professors” to maintain their position of excellence atop the educational field, and even creating new hierarchical arrangements among universities. The edX initiative, for example, is the effort by universities like Harvard and MIT to market their own courses to other universities. Trading on the Harvard and MIT name, edX is creating new revenue streams on the backs of less prestigious institutions.

Coursera and Udacity MOOCs are not really “connectivist” in the sense by which Siemens and Downes meant the term. For the post-2012 MOOC, learning is to be a process that focuses on the individual learner, who acquires new knowledge or skills, and is individually responsible (and graded) on how well he or she puts that learning into practice. As a fully marketized commodity, this MOOC is only legible at the level of the individual.

Given these realities, I would suggest that MOOCs are simply a new way of maintaining the status quo, of re-institutionalizing higher education in an era of budget cuts, skyrocketing tuition, and unemployed college graduates burdened by student debt. If the MOOC began in the classroom as an experimental pedagogy, it has swiftly morphed into a process driven from the top down, imposed on faculty by university administrators, or even imposed on administrators by university boards of trustees and regents. For academic administrators and policymakers, the MOOC phenomenon is all about dollars and cents, about doing more of the same with less funding. And while MOOC-boosters like to deride the “sage on the stage” model of education- delivery—as if crowded lecture halls are literally the only kind of classroom there is—most of the actually-existing MOOCs being marketed today are not much more than a massive and online version of that very same “sage on the stage” model. Through edX, for example, San Jose State University is incorporating videos of lectures by Harvard professors into its own curriculum in an explicit attempt to build a model that can then be expanded throughout the California State University system, the largest public university system in the world. But that model is simply a massive expansion of the lecture-based content delivery that the MOOC boosters claim to despise. And what could be more hierarchical than a high prestige university like Harvard lecturing to a less prestigious institution like SJSU?

Indeed, for those of us in California, the “MOOCification” of public higher education looks more like a land-rush than a tsunami, a massive give-away of public assets to private corporate interests. San Jose State University is literally located within Silicon Valley, so it’s not surprising that it has taken the lead in building bridges between educational startups and public higher education, outsourcing some of its own teaching to edX on the one hand and partnering with Udacity to offer online courses on the other. But if California is where everything happens first, as we are so often told, then we should be watching very closely how this state’s government and Silicon Valley are using MOOC fever as a cover to privatize public higher education. There is currently a bill pending in the California legislature— SB520—which will require California’s public universities to accept course credit from selected online course providers, in hopes of eventually outsourcing as much as 20 per cent of their curricula. Much of this outsourcing will likely go to for-profit online institutions, the sector of the education industry which consistently produces the worst results at the highest cost. Student retention in this sector is low, fees are high, and the quality of learning outcomes is poor.

To put it as simply as possible, the California legislature proposes to solve a real systemic crisis—collapsing public resources, diminishing affordability, and falling completion rates in the state’s higher education system—by sending its students to MOOCs. To the bill’s sponsor, Darrel Steinberg, and to Governor Jerry Brown, MOOCs seem like a win-win solution to an intractable fiscal crisis. On the one hand, students who are locked out of overenrolled core courses can complete their degrees by taking those classes with an online provider, possibly even at a lower cost to students and at no extra cost to the state. On the other hand, allowing Silicon Valley start-ups like Coursera and Udacity to offer courses for transfer credit in the California State and University of California systems will give those companies a legitimacy in the education marketplace that they have never had before.

As UCSB professor and higher education commentator Chris Newfield put it recently in a blog post, this bill—and the associated MOOC frenzy—is “a straight business play”:

MOOC momentum is being driven not by educational need or proven technological achievement but by a business lobby with connections and resources as good as Wall Street’s, and with a better social cause. The movement’s systematic exaggerations, the lack of concern for impacts on the public university ecosystem, the staged benevolence towards a hostile customer—all are hallmarks not of technical or pedagogical progress but of a carefully designed business strategy.

If this bill passes, the winners will be Silicon Valley and the austerity hawks in the California legislature: the former will have privileged access to the largest student market in the state, while the latter will be relieved of the financial burden of having to educate the state’s young people.

To put it quite bluntly, MOOCs are a speculative bubble, a product being pumped up and overvalued by pro-business government support and a lot of hot air in the media. Like all speculative bubbles—especially those that originate in Silicon Valley—it will eventually burst. Columnists, politicians, university administrators, and educational entrepreneurs can all talk in such glowing terms about the onrushing future of higher education only because it hasn’t happened yet; the MOOC can still be all things to all people because it is, in the most literal sense of the word, a speculation about what it might someday become. While students and professors invest their time and energy, Silicon Valley is betting that MOOCs will be the next big thing in higher education, and politicians like California Governor Jerry Brown are aggressively pushing the state’s public universities to incorporate MOOC’s into their curriculum, gambling that massive, open, and online courseware will be the solution to the state’s continual crisis in higher education funding.

Ontario’s higher education system, as with many other jurisdictions around the world, shares many challenges with California: unsustainable student costs, declining public investment, and austerity-focused politicians. California is often held up as an example for Ontario to emulate. So, if the MOOC frenzy has not fully hit Canada yet, it is safe to bet that it will be there soon. Like California, Ontario may be tempted to take its chances on a speculative bubble, one that dismantles the public university and privileges private interests. It’s a gamble we can’t afford to lose. 

Aaron Bady is a doctoral candidate in English literature at the University of California at Berkeley, and he writes and tweets for The New Inquiry as @zunguzungu.He begins a post-doc appointment at the University of Texas at Austin this Fall

This decision did not go over well with users of census data, including provincial and municipal governments, non-government organizations, academics, the media, pollsters, and many others. According to one count, 370 organizations— representing the whole spectrum of the Canadian population—expressed their displeasure at the decision.

The government’s initial response was two-fold: they insisted that Statistics Canada had given them advice that a voluntary survey can produce as good results as a census; and they claimed that Statistics Canada and its Chief Statistician were totally supportive of the government on this issue. This was not the case. I should know; I was the Chief Statistician at the time. I resigned shortly thereafter.

It is useful to quote at length Alex Himelfarb on the reasons behind my resignation as the Chief Statistician:

Let me be clear about what this was not. This was not a public servant substituting his own judgment for that of the government or in any way being disloyal. Quite the contrary: in the face of criticism from colleagues, Statistics Canada seemed poised to implement the voluntary approach and, in the traditions of public service, Munir was and continues to be publicly silent about his advice. Nor was this an instance of a public servant fighting for turf or more resources. This is not about defending big government or public service jobs as some critics of government and public service will immediately assume. Indeed, the voluntary approach will cost more and require more people. Munir himself played a major role in the past in cost cutting and reducing the size of public service, and since becoming Chief Statistician, he has overseen cuts to surveys, cuts which the agency and some of its clients found very difficult and troubling, but which he did nonetheless and with no visible controversy. No, it was none of these things. This was about the integrity of Statistics Canada and of the public service (emphasis added). The decision to replace the long form census with a voluntary version put the Chief Statistician in a difficult position. The way the decision was handled put him in an impossible position.

These events were covered extensively by the Canadian media. The issue was taken up first by a Parliamentary Committee, then Parliament itself. It became an international news story.

But beyond the cancellation of the long-form and the resignation of the Chief Statistician, a third issue emerged which is equally important. However, it did not receive the attention it deserved. This is the issue of Statistics Canada’s independence from government interference. The following are the famous words of the Minister Responsible for Statistics Canada, Tony Clement, that appeared in an interview session with Steven Chase of the Globe and Mail on July 20, 2010:

Q: Is Statscan an independent agency? I am unclear on that.

A: It operates pursuant to legislation and it does report to a minister who is responsible and accountable to the public.

Q: So it’s not independent like [Auditor- General] Sheila Fraser? A: No. No. Q: S o it’s not arm’s length A: No. Q: Ok I was unclear on this. I think maybe I got the impression it was.

A: Sometimes some of them like to think they are—but that doesn’t make it so. They report to a minister.

Clearly, to the government of the day, Statistics Canada was not independent. This has serious implications for the quality and utility of data collected by Statistics Canada, and the public decision-making that this data supports.

This article examines the need for an independent Statistics Canada in order to ensure sound policy decision-making, informed public choice, and good government. First, it examines the importance of evidence-based decisions, and shows that this depends on high-quality data. It then goes on to look at how independence is necessary for Statistics Canada to achieve its goals, and how the current Statistics Act does not deliver that crucial separation from government. It concludes by proposing some changes to the legislation to achieve true independence.

The importance of evidence-based decision-making

Decisions based on evidence, rather than ideology, enhance the well-being of citizens both at the personal and public policy levels.

Consider monetary policy. The Bank of Canada has an inflation target and adjusts monetary policy when it believes the target will not be met to its satisfaction. Canada’s inflation outcomes, and the Bank of Canada’s role in that context, are some of the factors that have contributed to Canada’s strong economic performance in recent years, including its ability to cope with the current financial and economic crisis.

Consider corporate tax policy. Two contradictory views are often heard. On one side, the argument goes like this: lower corporate taxes increase investment that, in turn, improves productivity and creates jobs (the conflict between jobs and productivity in the short run is unfortunately forgotten in this equation). On the other side, the argument contends that corporate tax reductions transfer wealth from the poor to the rich, and this carries unacceptable social costs.

Only evidence can bridge the gap between these conflicting views to allow policy makers to follow a policy that enhances citizen well-being. This evidence could show that the outcome may depend on a range of other factors that may shift over time. Thus, it may be hard to determine a priori which of the two outcomes to expect at a point in time.

In an article I published in the April 20, 2011 Globe and Mail, I made three points based on evidence drawn from a particular time period to argue that Canadian corporate tax cuts did not produce the expected outcomes during this period: first, if we look at the actual investment performance during the 2000s in relation to the 1990s, we find that investment growth did not keep pace with profit growth by a long margin, even before taking into account the reductions in corporate tax; second, using simple illustrative calculations, every one-point reduction in the Canadian corporate tax rate was equivalent to the Government of Canada writing a $500 million cheque to the US government; and third, with the US corporate tax rate double that of Canada’s, we are nowhere in sight of US productivity growth which is the true anchor for any country’s rising living standards.

At a personal level, Canadians make decisions every day based on evidence. They look at mortgage rates before deciding whether, and where, to get a mortgage. They look at food prices to determine what to buy and how much. They look at the job market in various parts of the country to decide whether to move or not.

Now imagine all of this happening without citizens and governments paying attention to an evidence-based analysis of the issues: the Bank of Canada not interested in understanding why the inflation target is important; the federal government not realizing why it should or should not cut corporate taxes; and citizens not thinking about what high mortgage rates, high food prices, and job opportunities could do to their well-being. Without appropriate evidence-based analysis, we will all be poorer—in every sense of the word.

The importance of good data

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) provides a helpful example of what data can do for its users.

Data describe events as they unfold and thus give us information on things as they change. Every month Statistics Canada releases the CPI describing the change in consumer prices for the past month. It may show that average prices rose or fell by a particular magnitude. This monthly measurement can be compared with previous months to get a sense about inflation rates over different time periods.

Data can also be used to gain insight into a phenomenon. The detailed information contained in the CPI release can pinpoint where prices are changing most. For example, data may show that the main reason the average price rose last month was because of significant increases in auto insurance premiums. This would allow citizens to understand the reasons for an increase in their cost of living.

Data allow analysis of the reasons behind observed developments. Using other relevant data, such as the frequency and seriousness of accidents, it may be feasible to analyze the causes underlying the increase in insurance premiums. The understanding provided by this analysis can be helpful in making improvements in outcomes, such as a policy to improve highway safety that helps control insurance premiums.

The analysis made possible by data then allows the provision of a context for decision-making. The information contained in the analysis may, for example, show that the increase in insurance costs was driven by factors that may not be around permanently, in which case there may be no need for policy action. Or, this information may show otherwise.

Data help in decision-making. Indeed, it is the most important contribution data make to improve the well-being of citizens. Continuing with the CPI example, the increase in the inflation rate, along with the details of where the increased pressure may be coming from, gives the Bank of Canada the ability to relate this information to its objectives and adjust its policy levers to achieve desired results.

Data are also used to monitor progress in achieving objectives. For example, the Bank of Canada monitors progress on the inflation front by examining the core rate of inflation, which subtracts the volatile inflation components from the overall rate of inflation, in the context of its inflation targets.

Data are used as well to build systems. In the context of the CPI example, inflation is a key variable in the development of economic models that are used for a variety of purposes.

These models, built on data, can be used for forecasting and predicting. These predictions allow decision-makers to anticipate adverse events and take action. For example, models may show that the inflation rate could fall below the central bank’s target range, encouraging the bank to take preemptive corrective action.

Data are used as well for evaluation of outcomes. The evaluation exercise is helpful in determining whether or not objectives have been achieved. If yes, the data can determine whether the goal was achieved satisfactorily, and if it had the desired effect. If not, the data can likewise show why not. Such evaluations are a key to making adjustments in public decision-making.

In sum, data provide the foundation for knowing things the way they are and taking steps to making things the way they should be. In this sense, the importance of data in enhancing human well-being must not be underestimated.

The need for an independent statistical agency

In view of the 2010 Census developments and the views expressed by the Minister responsible for Statistics Canada at the time, Canada would benefit significantly by enhancing Statistics Canada’s independence through changes to the Statistics Act.

Despite problems with the existing legislation, Statistics Canada was considered among the best statistical organizations in the world. Some would have rated it as the very best.

There were three key reasons for this reputation: its centralized structure allowed it to gather data for the whole country in a cost-efficient manner; its governance and management structure allowed it to be innovative; and it enjoyed a tradition of operating at arm’s length from all governments.

The decision by the government to abolish the longform census, and the Minister’s very public description of Statistics Canada as subject to political control, have damaged this long-held tradition.

Both of these factors—the cancellation of the long-form census and the Minister’s view—have negative consequences for the quality of data Statistics Canada produces.

First, it will affect the long-form survey data.

It is a statistical fact that a voluntary survey cannot hope to act as a substitute for a mandatory census. A voluntary survey will inevitably result in uneven response rates from different population groups and different geographic areas. Increasing the sample size cannot offset this problem. If there is a bias in the original sample, that bias will be magnified in a bigger sample if it continues to mimic the properties of the earlier, compromised sample. Suggesting that a voluntary survey with a larger sample size can replace a mandatory census is like saying that if you take a wrong turn, you should drive faster in the wrong direction to get to your destination. With a voluntary survey, many data users who depend on the long-form census—including the federal government—will lose the data quality they need.

Second, to the extent that the long-form census data provide a benchmark for other Statistics Canada surveys, the quality of data from these other surveys will also deteriorate.

If the government persists in the view that Statistics Canada is not independent, data quality—or at least the perception of data quality—will further suffer. Keep in mind that the vast majority of data users are not in a position to determine for themselves how good or bad the data are. They use them, and base their decisions on them, only to the extent that they can trust the organization that produces them. Trust in the organization depends on two critical factors: how good the organization is in technical matters, and how independent it is from government control to produce data that accurately reflect reality. Take away the independence of and trust in the organization, and even good data become less useful.

The Statistics Act and suggested changes

Section 7 of the Statistics Act gives the Minister wide-ranging powers on technical matters:

The Minister may, by order, prescribe such rules, instructions, schedules and forms as the Minister deems requisite for conducting the work and business of Statistics Canada, the collecting, compiling and publishing of statistics and other information and the taking of any census authorized by this Act…

Section 8 of the Act defines voluntary surveys as a technical matter, and states:

The Minister may, by order, authorize the obtaining, for a particular purpose, of information, other than information for a census of population or agriculture, on a voluntary basis…

On the issue of what questions should be asked in a census to collect data to satisfy the most important data needs of the country, the Act gives the authority to the government generally, in Section 21:

The Governor in Council shall, by order, prescribe the questions to be asked in any census taken by Statistics Canada…

Many other examples of the government and Minister’s role in managing Statistics Canada can be found in the Act. Overall, it is clear that despite its long tradition of independent action, the Statistics Act gives little protection to the autonomy of Statistics Canada.

There are three broad areas where I would suggest a change in the existing Act.

First, the Act should give the authority for all technical and methodological matters to the Chief Statistician. David Dodge, Mel Cappe, Alex Himelfarb and Ivan Fellegi—four eminent former senior public servants—also advocated for this proposal in a September 2010 letter addressed to the Prime Minister of Canada.

Second, give the authority to determine census questions to the Chief Statistician, as is the case in Australia. The census is a constitutional responsibility. However, given the way the Act currently reads, the government of the day can control the contents of the census. In the extreme, a government may ask as little as one question in the census, on any topic, to meet the constitutional requirement. There should obviously be a process where the Chief Statistician must base his/her decision about what questions to ask in the census on input received from citizens and data users. Statistics Canada currently follows a strict process that, as events have shown, can be overridden by political imperatives. A citizenand researcher-driven model, or some other independent mechanism, should be protected in law.

Third, given the nature of the responsibilities of the Chief Statistician (particularly if the law is amended as I have suggested), and the fact that Statistics Canada is a department of the government, the current mechanism for the appointment of the Chief Statistician should be replaced. At present, the Prime Minister appoints the Chief Statistician at his or her pleasure. Ivan Fellegi, a former Chief Statistician, has proposed the establishment of a committee of senior former public servants to put forward a list of appropriate candidates for the consideration of the Prime Minister. I support this proposal.

Concluding remarks

In this article, I have argued that evidence-based decision- making is essential to the enhancement of the well-being of citizens. Such decision-making is obviously not feasible without good evidence. We are fortunate in Canada to have Statistics Canada as our data collection agency. However, comments from the Minister Responsible for Statistics Canada in the context of 2010 census developments have brought to the fore a serious problem in the Statistics Act regarding the independence of the agency.

Trust in Statistics Canada is crucial for evidence-based decision-making. To ensure that that trust in the agency is not put at risk, we must amend the Act to enshrine in law what previously was a strong tradition of independence and autonomy. The cancellation of the long-form census highlights how this independence is currently vulnerable. To ensure the best outcomes for the citizens of Canada, we need to protect Statistics Canada from outside interference.

Munir A. Sheik is a Distinguished Fellow and Adjunct Professor in the School of Policy Studies at Queen’s University. From 2008-2010, he was Chief Statistician of Canada.