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Irving has every right to reach out to journalists, and to go to court if it feels it has been wronged. That is not in dispute. But why are federal ministries farming out media requests to the private sector? Why are they revealing to companies the identities of journalists pursuing stories about those companies?

Photo by rving Shipbuilding Inc./CP

To be clear, if there are problems with welding aboard the DeWolf-class ships, that’s entirely within the public interest, especially considering that Irving is soon to begin construction of a much larger, much more expensive fleet of warships for the Navy. (The DND, for its part, denies any serious issues with the DeWolf, and says that though minor welding deficiencies were found, they will be easily rectified. Some degree of fine-tuning is not unusual when ships are launched.)

But that’s a secondary issue here. The key issue is the apparent cozy relationship between our federal ministries and a private-sector entity.

The key issue is the apparent cozy relationship

The journalist’s request was to the Canadian government. The responsibility for replying lay with the Canadian government. This government, in particular, has touted its commitment to transparency; answering questions on a matter of public interest regarding a multibillion-dollar program is literally the least it can do to meet that standard. Farming out its job to the private companies at the heart of the potential news story is wildly inappropriate and raises troubling concerns about the ability of the government to effectively manage its relationships both with this country’s free press and our defence industry.

The government has said it will investigate this incident, and will make interim changes to policies in the meantime. Fair enough. We’ll be watching.