The Alberta government plans to rewrite and split its freedom of information and privacy law in two, the first major change to access legislation in the province since the early 2000s.
The changes would make political staff exempt from access requests, amend timelines for requests and institute steep fines for privacy violations.
The announcement was made on Wednesday by Nate Glubish, Technology and Innovation Minister, and Dale Nally, Minister of Service Alberta and Red Tape Reduction, who said the new legislation was in part a response to a call-to-action from Canada’s information commissioners.
“Our digital environment has changed dramatically over the past few decades. The world has moved on – but our legislation has not," Mr. Nally said. “Albertans have made it clear that it’s time to update these laws to align with today’s realities. As our world has shifted from paper to digital so have our expectations for access to information.”
Last fall, Canada’s information commissioners – the top civil servants responsible for overseeing public bodies’ compliance with access laws – signed a joint resolution calling on federal, provincial and territorial governments to modernize access laws. They signed a similar pact in 2019.
That resolution came on the heels of Secret Canada, a Globe and Mail investigative series launched in 2023 that probed the state of Canada’s access systems and found that public institutions are routinely breaking the law by overusing redactions, violating statutory time limits and claiming “no records” exist when they do. These organizations also face few – if any – consequences for ignoring the precedents set by courts and commissioners.
Changes to Alberta’s freedom of information (FOI) law under Bill 34, the Access to Information Act, would write political staff out of the law by making their records exempt from disclosure; establish timelines for information commissioner reviews; and update protocols around the deadlines for access requests.
Meanwhile, privacy law changes in Bill 33, the Protection of Privacy Act, would prohibit the sale of personal information by public bodies; grant the commissioner enhanced powers; and significantly increase penalties for violations, giving Alberta the highest fines anywhere in Canada. Under current law, a person fined for a personal information violation will pay up to $10,000. With the proposed legislation, that maximum would increase to $125,000.
Both laws would also require reviews every six years.
In splitting its law in two, Alberta would mirror the system used by the federal government, which also has separate legislation for access and privacy.
FOI laws are intended to promote transparency by allowing records to be requested from public institutions. These laws require institutions to disclose the requested information with limited exceptions.
The Alberta government became a focus of The Globe‘s investigation last year after the province’s ministries refused to supply data on FOI requests, a decision Diane McLeod, the province’s Information and Privacy Commissioner, called “very unfortunate.”
After that, The Globe filed a new set of access requests to Albertan ministries asking for FOI data, and was again refused. Shortly thereafter, Ms. McLeod‘s office opened a systemic investigation into ministries’ handling of access requests. That investigation is ongoing.
During Wednesday’s press conference, The Globe asked Mr. Nally why political staff were being written out of the new legislation. He said the government was “simply clarifying what has already been the case.”
“Political staff have always been exempt,” he said. “It just hasn’t been clear in the legislation. So we’re putting forward the amendments to articulate that clarity because, again, Albertans want and should have access to government records – but not necessarily political conversations.”
However, in an interview, Alberta NDP justice critic Irfan Sabir said Mr. Nally was incorrect. When he was community and social services minister, from 2015 to 2019, Mr. Sabir said his staff’s e-mails were regularly released in response to access requests.
He also criticized the government’s record on access to information.
“This government has a record of not being transparent, making it difficult for Albertans to access information and not providing proper resources to the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner,” Mr. Sabir said.
The government said it aims to proclaim the new legislation this spring.