Controlling Internal Access To Local Government Records

Business Information
As we can see, elected officials and other officers of a local government, as well as employees, have a limited right to access personal information in the control of the local government. It is not clear whether elected officials are entitled to access other types of information, such as the business information that is described in section 21 of FOIPPA. This type of information is often given to the local government because the person involved has an application before the local government that will ultimately find its way to the agenda. Elected officials may have to see that information as part of their decision making process.

There is an explicit set of circumstances described in section 21 that must occur before disclosure of the information is considered harmful to the business interests of a third party. The information must be supplied, implicitly or explicitly, in confidence, and must consist of trade secrets of that person, or commercial, financial, labour relations, scientific or technical information relating to that person.

In addition to the foregoing, the disclosure of that information must have been reasonably expected to harm significantly the competitive position or interfere significantly with the negotiating position of the party, or result in similar information no longer being supplied to the local government when it is in the public interest that similar information continues to be supplied.

Moreover, the disclosure must reasonably be expected to result in undue financial loss or gain to any person or organization, or reveal information supplied to, or the report of, an arbitrator, mediator, labour relations officer or other person or body appointed to resolve or inquire into a labour relations dispute.

If the person consents to the disclosure of his or her information, then section 21 will not apply.

The limitations on disclosing business information illustrate the care that must be taken by all officers and employees of a local government in handling records containing information of all types.