Guide to Canadian government sites on the Internet.

• Author: Valerie Footz

As governments are known to be large producers of information, it seems natural that they would have a significant presence on the Internet. This guide is basically an annotated listing to selected sites. Please keep in mind that the Internet is a dynamic place so the sites listed below may have been added to, redesigned or moved since the time of writing. The Universal or Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is placed in brackets where appropriate.

Federal

(http://canada.gc.ca)

Open Government (http://info.ic.gc.ca/opengov/) is Industry Canada's attempt to provide information to Canadian citizens via the Internet. It was the first significant foray of a Canadian department into the World Wide Web and it remains one of the most important sites. Open Government includes information such as details about the House of Commons and other political bodies, Supreme Court of Canada rulings, and government documents and treaties.

One of the major sections under the Canada Department of Justice (http://canada.justice.gc.ca) is the Canadian Statutes and Regulations (http://www.droit.umontreal.ca/ACJNet/index_en.html). Currently under construction, this is where the Statutes of Canada may be found. Users who access this site via a Web browser such as Netscape or Mosaic can conduct searches for keywords in statutes or select the desired statutes or select the desired statute or part of interest by clicking on a table of contents. One major limitation is that if viewed through a text based system (such as a FreeNet) users are not able to utilize the search capability and must manually scroll through the table of contents. This site is to be updated twice a year and does not have official sanction.

British Columbia

(http://www.gov.bc.ca)

There is no Department of Justice page; however, the Law Reform Commission (http://bbs.qp.gov.bc.ca/lrc/lrchome.htm) is available. BC is one of the few provinces to begin to post legislative publications. First reading bills, third reading bills, votes and proceedings, orders of the day and the Hansard (http://bbs.qp.gov.bc.ca/legis/legisb.htm) can be found on the Queen/Es Printer homepage. Unofficial versions of selected statutes (http://freenet.vancouver.bc.ca/local/wcel/statutes/bc/welcome.html) can be found on the Vancouver FreeNet.

Manitoba

(http://www.gov.mb.ca)

A picture of the current Minister of Justice and Attorney General (http://www.gov.mb.ca/manitoba/minister/minjus.html) is available, but no other departmental...