The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) and the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) filed a joint objection, and they are being represented by the Samuelson-Glushko Canadian Internet Policy & Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC). In their statement issued this morning, CAUT and CFS stressed the overreaching nature of the proposed tariff in terms of its costs, its definitional scope and the extraordinary monitoring it proposes. 

The tariff issue has heated up considerably in the past few days as indicated by postings and discussion on Howard Knopf's and Michael Geist's blogs.

The Canadian Library Association (CLA) and the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations (CASA) have also posted their objections and I will continue to post links to objections as they become available. A full analysis of these and other objections will follow.

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Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty has responded to the British Columbia Library Association (BCLA) acknowledging their submission on the G20 summit. While he doesn’t say much in the response, (indeed he fails to acknowledge any provincial responsibility); it is good that he at least acknowledged the letter that was sent from BCLA on July 16th.  BCLA had expressed concerns about "the unprecedented curtailment of civil liberties that took place in the June 2010 meeting of the G20 in Toronto" and they for a full public inquiry.  No doubt the Premier is wondering why he is hearing from a library association from BC and not the Canadian Library Association (CLA) itself (or for that matter the Ontario Library Association).

As I indicated in an earlier posting , CLA has so far remained silent on the issue even though its Advisory Committee on Intellectual Freedom had recommended issuing a statement of concern. 

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On July 14th  I gave a public lecture sponsored by the Faculty of Information & Media Studies at UWO, entitled "Bill C-32 and the Access Copyright Tariff: Double Trouble for Educators and Students."

The overhead presentation and audio files of the lecture are now available online at the Western Library's digital depository at http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/fimspres/4/. The video has also been posted on Western's YouTube Channel.

Howard Knopf has also posted a very compelling analysis of the proposed tariff (the deadline for objections is Wednesday, August 11th). The Canadian Library Association has also posted its objections to the tariff and its brief on Bill C-32 . 

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The British Columbia Library Association has sent a letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty expressing concern about "the unprecedented curtailment of civil liberties that took place in the June 2010 meeting of the G20 in Toronto" and calling for a full public inquiry.

This statement helps raise awareness of how the core library value of intellectual freedom, (as stressed in the  CLA Intellectual Freedom Statement) is broader in purview than the often cited examples of challenges to library collections, meeting room policies and open Internet access policies. While these traditional library IF issues are indeed crucial, BCLA's statement serves as an important reminder that threats to Intellectual Freedom are not always contained within the institutional boundaries of the library.

A broad coalition of civil rights, student, and labour groups issued an open letter similarly expressing concern about civil liberties violations and calling for a full public inquiry. While the joint statement was supported by a  number of labour groups whose affiliates represent library staff, BCLA is the first professional library association to weigh in on the issue. For its part, the Canadian Library Association has remained silent, despite an earlier recommendation from its Advisory Committee on Intellectual Freedom (of which I am a member).

Here is the full text of BCLA's letter. . .

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Criticism of the government's handling of the protests at the recent G20 summit in Toronto is mounting. Concerns include not only the use by the Ontario Cabinet of the 1939 Public Works Protection Act to vastly extend police powers, but also the actual conduct of the police on the ground during the summit. Several groups have called for full pubic inquiries.

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