That is a very important part of my mandate. Digital is about improving services to Canadian citizens. That's the bottom line. We're part of what was the D9—there may be more digital countries that have banded together, but there were nine the last time I heard—to share information, best practices and new ideas as to how to move forward to improve services to citizens.

The Open Government Partnership is almost a parallel initiative. It is a group of over 80 countries that have signed on to a partnership to improve and increase citizens' access to their government. Why is that important? It's important because by having access to government data, people can use the data to solve problems, to create apps or businesses and serve and grow the economy. By having government be open to citizens, they can be involved in decision-making. They can be consulted, so that better decisions get made.

When governments are more open and provide their data openly and consult, there is a stronger level of trust between citizens and their government. For some countries in this partnership, it has been a means of reducing corruption. Once the data is out there, then people can press their government to actually flow the funds that were supposed to have flowed to a particular initiative. One example that came up was a maternal health clinic. It's a very powerful tool for trust and for having better decisions made and having superior outcomes in the government's delivery of services.

Lastly, trust is about strengthening democracy as well. As the digital world gets much more sophisticated, that's a good thing, but at the same time we're seeing that it can be exploited or abused for negative purposes that divide people and create opportunities that undermine democracy. Open government is also about addressing that and finding ways to strengthen democracies and innoculate against the kinds of attacks on democracies that we've been seeing and that have used digital as a way to do it.

Joyce Murray

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