London police charged $130 for crime stats that 3 other forces gave for free. CBC News asks why

A London deputy police chief says it's standard protocol to have media outlets pay to access crime statistics despite other services in Ontario providing the same information for free. 

CBC News asked the London Police Service (LPS) for information on March 13 to provide the public context for a series of stories. The information requested was:

• The number of motor vehicle collisions involving a pedestrian from 2021 to present.
• The number of motor vehicle collisions involving a cyclist 2021 to present.
• The number of reported car thefts 2021 to present.
• The number of recovered stolen vehicles 2021 to present.

For each request, the LPS told CBC News to file a freedom-of-information (FOI) request, which comes with an initial $5 application fee. The request took 12 days to process.  

The police said the data was available to purchase on April 22 for $130. 

For years, the communication team at the LPS has told media outlets requesting statistics that its business analytics unit handles the requests and an FOI is required. Requests can cost hundreds of dollars, fees for the time it takes administrators to compile the data. A request can also be denied. 

CBC News decided to challenge the practice at LPS. It requested the same information about motor vehicle collisions and vehicle thefts from three other Ontario police forces. 

'What's good for one is good for all'

Waterloo Regional Police Service, Windsor Police Service and Peel Regional Police all provided CBC News the data for free, and within a few days. 

"It's a very difficult situation when a media outlet is trying to do a story that might have, not just community impact, but provincial impact or national impact," said Romayne Smith-Fullerton, a Western University professor and media critic. 

"They can easily gather information from some police forces that feel a public obligation, whereas the London police force feels a different obligation and is allowed to proceed in that way. We need legislation that makes it clearer that what's good for one is good for all," Smith-Fullerton said.  

Deputy Chief Paul Bastien said there's been a policy in place since 2022 at the LPS that says all requests for data are to be channelled to the business analytics unit. 

"What you're experiencing is potentially an overly blunt response to a situation about two years ago where we disclosed inaccurate information through our media office," said Bastien when asked what made LPS different from its counterparts. 

"There was information released and ultimately reported on that was inaccurate and had caused us to kind of walk things back."

Bastien would not say what the situation was about that caused police to change how it makes information available to the media. 

Through the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (MFIPPA), individuals have the right to request access to general records from local government institutions, including police services. 

Allowed to charge

Roxanne Beaubien has been providing communications and media relations support for police agencies for almost 20 years, including for the LPS from 2017 to 2020. 

She said some agencies collect statistics automatically, but under MFIPPA it is within their right to charge for the time it takes to recover them.   

London Morning8:31What it's like to get basic statistics from London Police Service

Should the media have to pay the police to tell you how many vehicles have been stolen in your city? In London that is often the case. CBC London reporter Angela McInnes compared accessing information from London Police Service with three other municipalities and shared those interesting results on London Morning.  

"My experience with policing services is that it really depends on the type of number that you're asking for, the statistic that you're asking for, the information that you're asking for," said Beaubien.

"Because if a labour intensive ask where they have to go into individual files to gather that information, then they often will charge for that time."

The LPS hired Chief Thai Truong last year, and in February, London city council approved a four-year budget of $672 million that will allow it to hire 97 new officers. 

Bastien said the LPS wants to modernize data management, governance and how it discloses information. 

"This might be some engagement with the public, and with members of the media as well, to find out what it is that you want to know on a regular or recurring basis."  

Bastien could not say when or in what form that engagement would take place, but said it should include a more streamlined internal process to make certain information more accessible.

CBC News did pay $130 for the information. Here are the statistics it received from the LPS: 

Motor vehicle collisions involving pedestrians

Motor vehicle collisions involving cyclists

Reported car thefts

Stolen vehicle recoveries