Long wait for improved Access to Information Act – Morgan

Minister of State in the Ministry of Education, Youth and Information Robert Morgan has blamed a packed legislative agenda for further delays in the long-awaited amendments to the Access to Information (ATI) Act.

Speaking on the final day of Right to Know Week 2021, Morgan said the amendments to the ATI Act, for which the Press Association of Jamaica (PAJ) has been pressing since 2011, are not likely to happen anytime soon.

“I do not expect us to have a new law until probably late 2022-23 because the legislative agenda is very packed. I think that’s a little ambitious, but I think if we push we can get it done,” he bluntly declared in response to a question from immediate past president of the PAJ, Dionne Jackson Miller.

Morgan, who spoke on the importance of access to Information laws and implementation to build back strong institutions for public good and sustainable development, explained that he also has been inconvenienced.

CHALLENGING PROCESS

“Our legislative process is very challenging. I personally, as minister, have about two or three pieces of things that are there as well. We have to keep pushing to get from AG (attorney general) that whatever we write and submit is synchronised with the laws that we already have on the books and there is no conflict. I expect that within a couple months, probably three or four, it will leave from AG, then to Cabinet and after that, you will have the ability to have consultations.”

Passed in June 2002, the ATI gives citizens and other persons a general legal right of access to official government documents that would otherwise be inaccessible. By recognising and upholding this right, the act aims to reinforce fundamental democratic principles vital to improved, more transparent government; greater accountability of government to its people; increased public influence on, and participation in national decision making; and informed knowledge of the functioning of government.

Speaking in August 2017, then PAJ President Jackson Miller noted that Section 38 of the ATI Act states that it “shall be reviewed from time to time by committees of both Houses of Parliament” and that “the first such review shall be conducted not later than two years after the appointed day”.

She further noted that a review had taken place, though late.

“The act came into effect in 2004. It was not until 2008, however, that both Houses of Parliament passed resolutions calling for the establishment of a joint select committee to examine the act and make recommendations arising from the review.

The former PAJ president argued that the joint committee made some important recommendations, even though it could have gone further to improve the act.

“Nevertheless, enactment of those initial recommendations would give us a much better system than we now have,” she said.