Delete, Dump and Destroy: Canada's Government Data Severely Compromised

sandbagger writes: Stories about government data and historical records being deleted, burned — even tossed into Dumpsters — have become so common in recent years that many Canadians may feel inured to them. But such accounts are only the tip of a rapidly melting iceberg. A months-long Maclean's investigation, which includes interviews with dozens of academics, scientists, statisticians, economists and librarians, has found that the federal government's 'austerity' program, which resulted in staff cuts and library closures (16 libraries since 2012) — as well as arbitrary changes to policy, when it comes to data — has led to a systematic erosion of government records far deeper than most realize, with the data and data-gathering capability we do have severely compromised as a result.

Comments

That's OK

[Anonymous Coward]

in 29 days we're tossing Harper and his religious doomsday-cult Luddites into the dumpster of history.

I hope.

Re:That's OK

[tom229]

Have you seen the polls? Everyone's pretty much tied at the moment. If this keeps up we may have the first time in history (I'm assuming, I haven't looked it up) where 3 parties all have nearly equal seats in the house.

Regardless, Harper isn't the problem. He's a problem, but he's not the problem. I'm in the middle of reading a book called "Irresponsible Government" by Brent Rathgeber, who is a long standing elected member of the house that has recently resigned from the conservative party to run independent. He explains that the real problem in Canada is the consolation of power in the executive branch, specifically in the PM office. He goes through our history, the causes, and what we can do to solve this fundamental problem which obviously points to some level of legislative reform. Highly recommended reading if you want to understand how Harper has been able to push his personal agenda so effectively for so long.

Re:That's OK

[SlithyMagister]

A Conservative minority just means another election in a few weeks. Trudeau and Mulcair aren't going to work with Harper

Or with each other, unfortunately.

Re:That's OK

[CanadianMacFan]

Unfortunately polls mean nothing and may actually hurt come election day because if people think that there's a bunch of other people that are going to vote against Harper then their vote won't really matter.

My biggest concern is that the Liberals and the NDP are going to split the vote and allow the Conservatives to capture enough seats to win the election.

Re:That's OK

[epine]

I was thinking I might read this book. Then I looked up the authors (you left out National Post columnist Andrew Coyne). I still might read this book, though a freshly Windexed critical lens.

I only had to read a few of his pieces on supply management (which I know something about) to discover that Coyne has a few things clear in his head.

Basically, he's a class act with the framing effect.

I won't bore people with the gospel according to Daniel Kahneman. Instead we'll ignore the eminent literature and just cut to the chase.

Here's how it works in practice. You start talking about "the consumer" (embedded in hot-button phrases such as "if politician X really cared about the consumer"—magic tricks always work best with a flourish of misdirection) and everyone automatically puts on their "good consumer" face, which for carnivores, is bringing home the bacon at the best possible price. Seriously, no-one wants to be left off Santa Claus's "good consumer" list. So it's immediately clear that Canadian consumers want American prices, right?

How about we start the conversation differently?

Who here kicks their dog? Who here would use an electric cattle prod to cut another $0.02 of the price of sirloin steak? This time the reaction is a little different—no-one wants to make Santa's permanent record under "cruelty to animals".

So where's the conflict? The conflict here is that these are the same fucking people.

Call them a consumer, they want a low price. Mention the dog beater down the street, then they give a shit about animal welfare, even if it hits them in the pocket book (to a degree).

The Canadian system is pretty much the worst system for achieving the lowest possible price. The American system is pretty much the worst system for achieving animal welfare and certain other controls over the quality of the food supply. (Mention listeria or ebola and you'll quickly discover that all the same people want to make yet a third Santa Claus list—just so long as we're on whatever list Santa is presently examining, it's all good).

The American system isn't even a "free" market by how the average person images any kind of "free" thing anywhere actually works.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Chickens

Before anyone dumps me on their mental list of the short moment, I found the following equally interesting:

Greg Page on Food, Agriculture, and Cargill

It's a complex world out there. Even Harper deserves a critic with two eyes.

"Austerity." You keep using that word.

[ErikTheRed]

I do no think it means what you think it means. In governmental terms, it means "give us unlimited money so that we don't have to prioritize among the thousands of special interests begging and scraping for more cash."

In any other context it means that you are seriously lacking resources and have cut things to the bone. For you or me, it means we get rid of cable TV, the gym membership, take cheaper vacations, don't buy a new car, live in a smaller place, don't eat and drink out as often, etc.

Governments have a much, much different approach: they begin by exacting revenge on the unwashed masses that dare not give them every dime their hearts desire. They find popular things (especially parks and libraries) and immediately begin the slashing there. This is, of course, utterly petulant - these items aren't even rounding errors in the budgets and no real savings are made. In the US, we call it "Washington Monument Syndrome" - popular tourist destinations like the Washington Monument are shut down during budget battles for basically no reason other than a giant political temper tantrum. There still is, of course, plenty of money (billions! trillions!) for new fighter planes that don't work and imprisoning people for owning certain plants and giving people and corporations lifetime welfare benefits, etc.,etc., etc.

There is no "governmental austerity." Anybody who brings it up is playing Orwellian word games with you, and should have filthy socks shoved in their mouths (and possibly other body orifices) until they stop.

Re:"Austerity." You keep using that word.

[JBMcB]

Oldest trick in the book.

1. Cut library funding out of the general budget
2. Close the libraries saying that they are out of money
3. Run a special millage for the libraries

So your 'library millage' is actually a general fund millage that's been shifted around.

It works for a while - it's been done so many times in the city I live in now that the libraries are completely funded by millage.

Re:"Austerity." You keep using that word.

[dryeo]

Different type of library. These are science libraries, things like all the fisheries research that us taxpayers have paid for over the last 125 years. They claim that citizens aren't using the libraries, which is true as they are targeted at fellow scientists and shut them down including dumping and burning all the years of research. The idea is to do away with the fisheries, which bring in $100s of millions of dollars as well as food in favour of selling raw bitumen. If there are no records of the salmon, it can't be argued that the bitumen spill hurt the salmon.
The local libraries are not a Federal responsibility.

Re:"Austerity." You keep using that word.

[bledri]

I do no think it means what you think it means. In governmental terms, it means "give us unlimited money so that we don't have to prioritize among the thousands of special interests begging and scraping for more cash."

In any other context it means that you are seriously lacking resources and have cut things to the bone. For you or me, it means we get rid of cable TV, the gym membership, take cheaper vacations, don't buy a new car, live in a smaller place, don't eat and drink out as often, etc.

Governments have a much, much different approach: they begin by exacting revenge on the unwashed masses that dare not give them every dime ...

There is no "governmental austerity." Anybody who brings it up is playing Orwellian word games with you, and should have filthy socks shoved in their mouths (and possibly other body orifices) until they stop.

You are right that it's Orwellian, but wrong about how. This is not a tantrum against the masses, it's a tantrum against reality. The libraries in question are scientific libraries. Specifically libraries that contain environmental records related to pollution, biodiversity and climate. This is an attempt to continue the hamstringing of any science that shows the dark side of the so called free market. Intentional environmental ignorance is financial bliss for the oligarchy.

Re:"Austerity." You keep using that word.

[dryeo]

Most of it was not digitized and I've heard at least one fisheries scientist, researching something as harmless as where Cod breed, that papers that he had referenced were no more.
The anti-science and need to control goes deep with this government

Re:Sounds like a good thing

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I, for one, certainly can't imagine why having data might be useful when attempting to make decisions about what to do....

Re:Sounds like a good thing

[JMJimmy]

It seems like a good thing on the surface, except for the reasoning behind it. It's not about collecting/not collecting data, it's about de-funding those who don't vote conservative. It's classic right wing tactics, they funnel money to their supporters by doing things like creating laws that will be struck down by the courts and hiring pro-conservative lawyers to defend them, increased military spending, etc. Those law firms, soldiers, etc. then give back to the conservative party in votes/donations. Then on the de-funding side they slash left-wing programs like libraries, sciences, etc. so those who would support a left-wing party don't have the funds to donate to them. There's also the motto of "rule as badly as you can" which makes government seem incompetent/short sighted which propels their anti-big-government agenda.

Also, unlike the US government, the Canadian government sells non-personal data it collects to businesses instead of giving it away. It's actually a fairly profitable revenue source for the government.

The Ministry of Truth.....

[TrimTabTim]

The Ministry of Truth says you must use your Brother issued memory hole. Remember citizens:

WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

Why would our Brother store knowledge and data? These things are unalways good for Brother. You know the old speaking: those who never learn history are doomed to... Um. Wow, kittens! My speakwrite told me yesterday that Oceania kills kittens, I like kittens, we must destroy Oceania!

We must all be strong. Ignorance is strength. Big Brother is doubleplusgood.