Alberta Information And Privacy Commissioner Calls For Changes To Proposed Public Sector Access And Privacy Legislation

On November 20, 2024, the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner (OIPC) of Alberta published comments and a call for changes regarding two new bills tabled by the Alberta government earlier this month: Bill 33, the Protection of Privacy Act, 2024; and Bill 34, the Access to Information Act, 2024. These bills would replace Alberta’s existing public sector access and privacy law, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FOIP Act), with two new pieces of legislation, the Protection of Privacy Act (PPA) and the Access to Information Act (AIA). According to the OIPC, these updates would be the first substantial amendments to the FOIP Act since 1995.

In letters addressed to Alberta’s Minister of Technology and Innovation and Minister of Service Alberta and Red Tape Reduction, the OIPC raised a number of concerns regarding the bills as they are currently drafted.

Regarding Bill 33, the OIPC noted concerns such as:

• the lack of a paramountcy provision;
• the lack of guardrails regarding the authority of public bodies to collect, use and disclose personal information for a common or integrated program or service;
• the lack of transparency for data matching;
• carve-outs exempting certain records, such as communications between political staff and ministers, from the PPA’s applicability;
• inadequate security provisions in comparison to other provincial privacy legislation;
• new authority to disclose personal information of a minor without consent; and
• the lack of protection for Albertans relating to the creation and use of automated decision-making systems by public bodies.

Regarding Bill 34, the OIPC’s concerns included:

• expanded exceptions and carve-outs to the right of access;
• new definitions that may decrease Albertans’ rights to access electronic information;
• new authority for public body heads to disregard access requests;
• new authority for public bodies to extend timelines to respond to access requests; and
• erosion of certain OIPC powers.

The OIPC concludes both letters by acknowledging that the adoption of the PPA and AIA would have a considerable impact on the workload of the OIPC.

The full text of the letters to the ministers and the OIPC’s comments can be read here.

Summary By: Claire Bettio