[open-government] Last Chance - Municipal transparency help

Wed May 29 04:16:46 UTC 2013

On the other hand, governments are much more likely to disclose tender data than transactional data. There are still enough big problems in tenders that we don't need to worry about a civil servant spending too much at Tim Hortons or similar (though, that does make for news stories). The UK parliamentary expenses scandal, for example, didn't really have that much of a financial impact - a few million pounds worth of fraud can be accomplished in a single fraudulent tender. It did have an impact in terms of MPs leaving politics and the public losing faith - and hopefully the long-term result of that is more responsible MPs or at least long-lasting reforms for better oversight.

On 2013-05-28, at 11:44 PM, Anders Pedersen wrote:

> Hi Jonathan, 
> 
> I've added a comment in your questionnaire arguing that there will likely be a difference between requesting tender data, which you have suggested and asking for transactional spending data:
> 
> Two examples (which might, might not be relevant in your case):
> 1) Civil servants pay multiple visits to Tim Horton purchasing coffee below the amount threshold for tenders 
> 
> 2) Department of education experiences hikes in rental costs from the Department of Municipal Property, which owns the buildings. 
> 
> In both cases you could be considerably better off from having access to full transactional spending data, than merely having access to tender data.
> 
> Best,
> Anders 
> 
> On 28 May 2013 23:05, Jonathan Brun <jbrun at jonathanbrun.com> wrote:
> Hello all,
> 
> We are wrapping up a proposed questionnaire for municipal office candidates, any comments or tips would be appreciated!
> 
> https://docs.google.com/a/jonathanbrun.com/document/d/1zn4KehQOv6IIRlJBi4kGjtHOdbYpS5nh4tcu7rffx4o/edit
> 
> Date to complete it: May 31st
> 
> JB
> QuebecOuvert.org - MontrealOuvert.net
> jonathanbrun.com - @jonathanbrun
> 
> 
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> Anders Pedersen
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