Expand and improve open data: Commitment 3

The Government of Canada will increase the quality and visibility of federal data holdings and set measurable targets for the release of open data over the next five years.

Lead department:

Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat; Statistics Canada

Email address for enquiries:

Other involved actors:

Contributing Government of Canada departments

Overall status:

Most deliverables on schedule.

You'll have access to diverse, high quality government data that is discoverable, accessible, and reusable. You'll also be able to interact directly with the Chief Statistician and with Statistics Canada analysts to better understand the data and the importance of official statistics.

Status of Open Government Plan milestones (complete, substantial, limited, not started)

Completed:

• 3.1 Develop and publish departmental inventories of federal data, as required by the Directive on Open Government, to support collaboration with the public on setting priorities for the release of open data.
• 3.4 Provide access to high-quality, open statistical data and information from Statistics Canada, free of charge, in machine-readable formats under an open license and accessible via Open.Canada.ca:
  • 3.4.1 Release the results of the 2016 Census (Short Form and Long Form) in 2017 based on a published release schedule.
    • Statistics Canada can report that the publication of the 2016 Census results is complete and all planned release dates were met: http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/index-eng.cfm?HPA=1 . The data are found on the Statistics Canada website and are also discoverable via the federal Open Government It should be noted that this publication calendar was a full 10 months faster compared with the release of the 2011 Census results.
  • 3.4.2 Host on-line "Chat with an Expert" sessions and in-person "Talking Stats" events to enable Canadians to interact with Statistics Canada analysts and better understand the published data.

• 3.5 Improve Canadians’ access to data and information proactively disclosed by departments and agencies through a single, common online search tool:
  • 3.5.1 Enhance self-service tools for departments to publish proactive disclosure information to strengthen the quality of data being released.
    • Single online system (tool), registry.open.canada.ca, has been developed and is being used by departments to standardize, consolidate and publish proactive disclosures.
    • TBS has also worked closely with policy owners for Contracts, Grants and Contributions and Travel and Hospitality to update the data elements collected for each disclosure type, in order to align it to updates made to the policy

Substantial:

• 3.2 Set a baseline for the total volume of open data to be released over time and establish departmental targets for the publication of releasable data over the next five years:
  • 3.2.1 Publish departmental targets and progress on departments’ release of open data.
    • The ‘Progress Tracker for Open Data’ dataset has been released on the Open Government Portal. It captures the number of datasets that have been released in the past year, as well as the estimated number of datasets that organizations plan on releasing by June 2018, November 2018 and March 2019.
• 3.3 Develop and refine guidance to help federal departments and agencies set priorities for releasing high-value open data and understand the specific circumstances under which data cannot be released for privacy, security, and/or confidentiality reasons:
  • 3.3.1 Establish data quality standards for open data;
  • 3.3.2 Provide guidance on engaging with key communities in Canada (e.g., First Nations, Inuit, and Métis, etc.) to better understand their needs when setting priorities for the release of open data;
  • 3.3.3 Develop metadata standards to enhance data interoperability and discoverability; and
  • 3.3.4 Develop guidance on the anonymization of datasets.
    • The Open Government Guidebook, created in collaboration with GC organizations, has been released as a draft on the Open by Default Portal. This document includes:
      • Draft open government data and information standards, which provides guidance on how to apply data and information quality standards to open government resources released on open.canada.ca
      • An ‘Outreach and Engagement’ section to provide guidance on how to engage with users
      • The Open Government Metadata Application Profile, which details the metadata elements that are used to describe datasets and assets added to the Open Government Portal.
• 3.6 Adopt the International Open Data Charter and initiate implementation of the Charter requirements:
  • Encourage civil society and private sector organizations to open up their own data where this would be of public benefit; and
  • Measure progress and report on Canada’s implementation of Charter principles.
    • The Charter has been adopted and a report on progress will be complete by the end of June 2018

Other completed milestones:

• Departmental open data inventories were published for the first time in March 2017. With the creation of these inventories, over 1,500 new datasets have been identified as eligible for release. In addition to having the ability to search through the inventories on open.canada.ca, citizens also have the option to communicate with the Government by voting on datasets most useful to them. This in turn will help departments and agencies to fast track the more popular datasets for release based on voting. See related blog.
• Open.Canada.ca was re-launched in October 2016 to improve the search and discovery of open data records by developing an integrated search with more search filters and enriched metadata. This has improved Canadians' access to data and information proactively disclosed by departments and agencies.
• Since June 2016, over 4,000 new non-spatial datasets and 27,000 new geospatial datasets have been released on open.canada.ca. (see: Open Government Analytics).
• Fifteen “Chat with and Expert” sessions and five “Talking Stats” events took place between July 2016 and May 2018. Three events, part of a Speaker Series for Canada 150, took place between April 25, 2017 and October 31, 2017.
• The Open.Canada.ca portal is accessible to all (WCAG compliant) and does not require registration.
• The Open Government Licence applies to all portal content (data and information).
• To support greater comparability and interoperability of data across Canada we are working with governments to identify common high-value data sets, identify existing standards, and identify resources that support open government capacity.
• The publication of the 2016 Census results is now complete and all planned release dates were met: http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/index-eng.cfm?HPA=1 . The data are found on the Statistics Canada website and are also discoverable via the federal Open Government portal.
  • This publication calendar was a full 10 months faster compared with the release of the 2011 Census results.

• Information published on the portal must be bilingual and accessible, which can take more time than we'd like. Are you aware of potential tools/solutions that could help with these challenges?