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Suzanne Legault, Information Commissioner of Canada, isn't impressed with the Liberal record so far. Sean Kilpatrick / THE CANADIAN PRESS

For the second year in a row, a Canadian prime minister attended the annual parliamentary press gallery dinner, and for the second year in a row, Justin Trudeau was charming and funny. Clearly, the man is accessible, in contrast to the previous prime minister, who avoided such events with fierce determination.

But as with many things Trudeau, symbolic shows of openness havent entirely been matched by the actions of his no-longer-new government. Days after the merriment among journalists and their political guests, Canadas information commissioner released her annual report on government accessibility and its as grim as it was under that last prime minister.

Suzanne Legault talks of the hopeful tone that accompanied the election of the Liberals in late 2015. Promises to unlock government that is, actually share information in a reasonable manner with taxpayers abounded early among the Trudeau team, and ministerial mandate letters urged openness from federal departments. Treasury Board president Scott Brison even put out a directive saying federal agencies should be open by default. But, concludes Legault in her new report, The year is ending with a shadow of disinterest on behalf of the government.

Our investigations reveal, once again, that the (Access to Information) Act is being used as a shield against transparency and is failing to meet its policy objective to foster accountability and trust in our government. She notes the ongoing culture of secrecy within the public service, adding that the Clerk of the Privy Council, the highest ranking bureaucrat, has given his troops no direction on transparency.

Why should Canadians care? After all, in the shadow of the Trump administrations perpetual crises, or the mess that faces Britons, Canadas chronic case of bureaucratic sphincter-tightening and childish government message control seem minor problems.

Theyre not. Youre entitled to a full accounting of how your tax dollars are used and so are businesses, academics, artists, scientists, homemakers and anyone who uses the federal Access to Information Act to try to pry loose information we should, frankly, all be able to get just by asking for it. Instead, the access law is repeatedly abused, with Orwellian glee, to withhold answers from Canadians.

For instance, Legaults office investigated the deletion of emails by an employee at Shared Services Canada. That agency, you may recall, has run into all manner of trouble trying to update the governments IT systems, while spending vast swaths of your money. Under the information act, the agency got a request for all SSC emails that mentioned the Liberal party since it had taken office. An employee duly forward 12 pages for processing, but it turned out that almost 400 pages of emails were deleted after the agency received the formal request for the information. That sounds like someone breaking the law, and the case had gone to the attorney general.

In another instance, the RCMP was asked, using the access act, for communications around its decision not to conduct a perjury probe of one of the officers who testified before a commission on the death of Robert Dziekanski, the Polish immigrant who was tasered and died at Vancouver Airport in 2007. The information commissioners investigation of why no records were released to the person requesting them turned up the amazing discovery that the RCMP didnt have any. This is a serious gap in the historical record of a tragic case that has a high level of public interest, a gap that raises accountability issues within the RCMP, Legaults report notes.

The lapses go on: lags in making information available about SNC-Lavalins overbillings of government, for instance; problems with Canada Post not explaining why some people arent getting their mail; the refusal by a government agency to release a harmless map; even attempts to withhold historical documents from 1918 by Library and Archives Canada.

Legaults data show things are not improving under the Liberals. The prime minister may be good at dinner speeches that make him look accessible. But real action on transparency? Not so much.

Christina Spencer is the Citizens editorial pages editor.

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Spencer: So much for more open government under the Liberals - Ottawa Citizen