By CBC News

Canada lags behind most other countries when it comes to sharing data with its citizens, according to the chair of the standing committee on access to information.

Charlottetown MP Shawn Murphy's committee has been looking into how other jurisdictions make their documents available to the public.

"To give you an example, the United States now has 310,000 data sets on a public format. It will save the government money in dealing with all these endless access to information requests because a lot of the information, of course, will be available and accessible online."

Murphy said witnesses who have appeared before his committee have provided some innovative ideas.

One thing the federal government could do right now is put all environmental assessments online, he said.

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Do you think the Canadian government needs to be more open with sharing information? What kind of data would you like to be made more available? Let us know in the comments below.