Greetings All. In my last message I stated that I would be away from the computer until tomorrow (Saturday) however here I am again. I guess I am addicted. I do, however, have a reason for coming back tonight. Life has it's ironies, and it would appear that I have been subject of some of them today. After a delay of almost six months, because I made an Access to Information Request for the Report of the Expert Panel on Access to Historic Census Records, Industry Minister Brian Tobin made the Report available to the public on 15 December 2000. Along with the release of this report Mr. Tobin issued a press release in which he stated that "further broad based consultation with all Canadians is needed. This consultation will take place as part of the already announced administrative and legislative review of the Access to Information and the Privacy Acts." His reference here was in regards to a press release of 21 August 2000 which announced the establishment of "An Access to Information Review Task Force". While it is expected there may be some progress reports, the press release stated "A final report will be released in the fall of 2001, which will analysze the administrative and legislative aspects of Access to Information and provide recommendations for improvement." Anything here sound familiar? Our response was, and still is, to deplore the refusal of Mr. Tobin to accept the recommendations contained in the Report of the Expert Panel. We opposed the inclusion of the Census issue in the mandate of this Task Force. We viewed his announcement of "further study" as a delaying tactic and have our doubts as to whether or not he has actually read the Report. We feel the idea is to "study the Census issue to death", or at least to the point where they finally manage to get a report that states what they want, rather than what the public wants - i.e. access to Historic Records. We continue to urge Mr. Tobin to accept the recommendations of the Expert Panel. We continue also to urge our MPs and Senators to vote in favour of Bill S-12, introduced in the Senate by Senator Lorna Milne, and an identical Bill soon to be introduced to the House of Commons by MP Murray Calder. This afternoon I received a phone call from Keith Lafrance, a member of the BC Genealogical Society, as am I. He called to advise he had received a fax addressed to me as Editor of the Global Gazette. The facts are that I am simply a writer for the Global Gazette, not the Editor, and the number to which the fax was sent is not mine. Fortunately Keith knew who I was or I would not have received the fax intended for me. Now comes the irony. The fax had been sent by Andrée Delagrave, Chair of the Access to Information Review Task Force mentioned above. The purpose of the fax was to invite me "to participate in a roundtable discussion on the federal Access to Information framework." The message further stated that I was "being invited to discuss aspects of access to information related to the specific interests of the stakeholders represented. You are being invited to participate in the first roundtalbe for those with expertise in the information busines, libraries, archives, genealogy, history, science associations, and publishing of government data." There you have it -- I am invited to participate, in a small way, in the Task Force which I have decried as not being necessary to our purpose. I would very much like to attend this roundtable discussion, however the hooker is that it is scheduled to take place at the Rideau Club on Monday, 26 March 2001 (10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.). While the message did not say so, my assumption is that the Rideau Club is in Ottawa and I live 25 kilometers east of Vancouver. The message makes no mention of the government paying for transportation or accomodation. My pension, while normally adequate, is not sufficient to pay for day trips to Ottawa. I will be checking on Monday to see if the government will be funding the trip, but otherwise I will be unable to attend. The message does make provision for someone other than myself to attend and I have someone in mind to take my place if I am unable to attend. I will keep you informed on what happens. Life's little irony #2 to follow tomorrow. Happy Hunting. Gordon A. WATTS gordon_watts@telus.net Co-chair, Canada Census Committee Port Coquitlam, BC Keep up to date on Post 1901 Census information at http://globalgenealogy.com/Census