RECORD-KEEPING MUST IMPROVE, HORGAN ADMITS
After criticizing the Liberals for it, NDP engage in same email shell game
Premier John Horgan stood in the legislature Thursday to admit what had been readily apparent for several days, that his New Democrats have failed to live up to their own standards on preserving records, particularly emails.
“I am disappointed that we are not always meeting that standard,” said Horgan in facing up to multiple rule-breaking by senior staffers in his own office and two members of the cabinet.
“I’m responsible for what goes on in this government, ” he told the house, “and I take full responsibility for not meeting the test that I set for us as a government when we were sworn in.”
Horgan confirmed that he’d ordered Don Wright, his own deputy minister and head of the public service, to “ensure that best practices are being used across government and ensure that if training has been inappropriate, better training be put in place.”
“I take this very seriously,” insisted the premier.
That was in contrast to his own MLAs and ministers.
For most of the week, New Democrats had mocked and sneered at the mere mention of the growing evidence of abuses on the government side.
“It’s important, not just to me and the people on this side of the house, but to British Columbians that when we say we’re going to do something, we follow through on it,” said Horgan.
Something British Columbians should not have expected was the NDP government getting it wrong on preserving records and emails for public scrutiny of decision-making.
In opposition, the New Democrats dined out on the B.C. Liberal government’s serial abuses of the rules. Having made political hay on the Liberal record of triple deletes, back-channel communications via personal email and other evasions, the New Democrats ought to have taken office with a clear determination to get things right from day one.
It hasn’t worked out that way, as Rob Shaw of The Vancouver Sun reported in a series of stories over the past week.
Last Friday, it was “Minister apologizes for using personal email.” The minister using the back-channel was none other than Jinny Sims, whose ministry for citizens’ services includes prime responsibility for records management and access to information.
Caught red-handed, Sims apologized: “I should not have used my personal email to contact staff and I’ll be more diligent in the future.”
She then spent much of this week refusing to answer detailed questions about what she relayed through the back channel, punctuating every duck and dodge with a reminder of the B.C. Liberal record as if that justified New Democrats going the same evasive route.
While Sims stonewalled, the trail of abuse spread. “Premier’s staff trashed emails; High-ranking officials improperly deleted months worth of messages,” was the headline on Shaw’s followup story Wednesday.
The mass deletions involved five officials in the premier’s office, including an assistant deputy minister, the director of operations, the director of liaison and co-ordination, the special adviser on First Nations, and the director of priorities and accountability.
Ironic that the director for accountability would have been eliminating any record of her own emails, but there you have it.
Horgan initially tried to insist that the several months’ worth of missing documentation was no big deal. “That was largely in the early days of their employment within the government,” he assured the house, adding: “Those records do exist on servers.”
No, not really.
“The archived copies of the deleted emails are not accessible to the public via access to information,” reported Shaw, whose expertise in the matter derives from having written extensively on the triple-delete scandal and myriad other abuses under the B.C. Liberals.
Adding to Horgan’s embarrassment, by the time he delivered his confessional during question period Thursday, his office confirmed that two more staffers in the premier’s office had been trash-canning their emails as well.
The other backdrop was provided by a third news story: “Advanced education minister defends email record-keeping.”
This after cabinet member Melanie Mark was found to have generated no emails whatsoever in response to an access-to-information request from the B.C. Liberals. She maintained she didn’t have to release any emails because those were archived by her deputy minister, a debatable claim that looked to be at odds with proper records keeping for ministers in the past as well as today.
Still Mark insisted: “I follow best practices in terms of records management. I follow the law with respect to what has been recommended from the privacy and information commissioner.”
Then before Horgan spoke Thursday, she was forced to admit to the house that after “triple-checking,” her staff had, well, yes, found some records that well, er, yes should have been provided to the Liberals. Had Mark not been so overconfident the first day — even offering to instruct the Liberals in how to use the government email program — her backdown would not have been such a big deal. Instead it added to the impression of a government that did not have a handle on the extent of the problem. Sims, the minister in charge of records management, insisted there were only “a small number of cases where best practices may not have been followed.”
Horgan had the good sense to acknowledge that he might well have more information to provide once he gets back an update from his deputy minister, due May 28 when the house convenes for the final week of his spring session.
I should not have used my personal email to contact staff and I’ll be more diligent in the future.
JINNY SIMS, minister of citizens’ services