Information Management in the Government of Canada - A Situation Analysis

1. Background

In the Speech from the Throne, the government announced that it would connect Canadians to all government information and services by the Year 2004. In such an emerging environment, featuring a range of recording media, from paper to electronic, government information must be current, accurate, understandable, trustworthy, and available in a timely manner. In establishing the initial IM/IT infrastructure to support Government On-line, the Treasury Board Secretariat (TBS) recognized that the ongoing quality and integrity of the government's information infrastructure would have to be addressed. Related concerns about the information infrastructure across government and within individual government institutions were raised by the heads of Information Technology (IT) and other senior officials such as the National Archivist and the Information Commissioner.

Based on these concerns, the TBS raised three questions:

• What is IM in the context of government program/service delivery and accountability?
• What are the IM issues and how do they relate to one another?
• What should TBS, lead agencies, government institutions and others be doing to address the IM issues?

These questions were addressed through an assessment study jointly sponsored by the TBS and the National Archives. The work, which was guided by a director general-level advisory committee co-chaired by the Deputy CIO and the Assistant National Archivist, was based on extensive consultation across government. Three background papers were developed as a result of the consultation. A draft of the report describing a proposed IM landscape, the IM issues, and proposed recommendations was reviewed by the Advisory Committee in March and a final draft was given to the Chief Information Officer and the National Archivist in April, 2000.