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Canada  

RCMP fabricated FOI reply

Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale says it's "unacceptable" that an RCMP employee fabricated a response to an access-to-information request.

Goodale says the individual involved was "at a very junior level" and has been disciplined.

The fabrication was revealed last week in a letter from RCMP Supt. David Vautour to Bruce Cheadle, a reporter for The Canadian Press who in May 2015 had requested information regarding the now-defunct long-gun registry.

Cheadle did not receive a response to his access request until March 1, 2016, but that letter was backdated almost five months.

Vautour said a note included with the tardy response claimed that the letter had originally been sent to Cheadle in October 2015, but was returned to the RCMP by Canada Post due to an incorrect postal code.

He said the Mounties have since determined that the backdated letter and the explanatory note were fabricated to avoid a possible complaint about the delay in responding to the request.

"Our office does not condone actions that are contrary to the RCMP core values of honesty, integrity and professionalism," Vautour wrote Cheadle.

"We want to advise you that we have addressed this matter through a formal disciplinary process and made the Office of the Information Commissioner aware of this matter."

Goodale noted that it was the RCMP itself that discovered the fabrication and informed both Cheadle and the access-to-information watchdog.

"This behaviour is not tolerated and discipline has been delivered," Goodale said Wednesday.



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