When an inquiry of the Heritage Ministry prompted the state broadcaster to divulge to the House of Commons how many non-disclosure agreements had been imposed on staff, the CBC refused, citing time constraints.

The question posed by NDP MP Don Davies asked the CBC and its French-language counterpart, Radio Canada, to inform the House of the number of non-disclosure agreements, non-disparagement agreements, and confidentiality agreements that the CBC signed with employees and contractors for each of the last 10 years.

In a hint to the number of gag orders of some form, chronic house-flipper Liberal MP Taleeb Noormohamed, as the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage, responded that as part of its business and employment activities, CBC/Radio-Canada concludes the state broadcaster has signed a wide variety of contracts and agreements, many of which could include non-disclosure or confidentiality provisions.

CBC/Radio-Canada, howver, admitted it does not track the specific number of those references. To gather the information requested, the state broadcaster said an extensive manual search and review of each contract concluded by the corporation would be required.

So, does that mean it's too much work to track the numerous gag orders down? What's going on at the CBC? What sort of toxic work environment is this taxpayer-funded behemoth percolating?