The Most Significant FOI Change in a Generation
Ontario’s government is moving to exempt the premier’s office, cabinet ministers, and parliamentary assistants from the province’s freedom-of-information laws, and the backlash has been swift and sharp.
The proposed changes would mean that emails, documents, and records from those offices could no longer be obtained through FOI requests. The amendments would also apply retroactively, potentially killing hundreds of pending requests, including ongoing investigations into the Greenbelt scandal and records related to Premier Ford’s cellphone.
For context: these would be the first major changes to Ontario’s FOI framework in roughly 40 years.
Who’s Raising the Alarm
The criticism is coming from all directions, opposition parties, legal experts, civil society groups, and most notably, Ontario’s own Information and Privacy Commissioner.
Commissioner Patricia Kosseim put it bluntly: “Public accountability is eviscerated” if ministerial records escape scrutiny.
James Turk of the Centre for Free Expression called it “obviously going to have a significant reduction in government accountability.” Democracy Watch’s Duff Conacher warned the changes “will make cabinet decisions and actions much more secret,” predicting the result will be “more corruption and waste.”
NDP Leader Marit Stiles and Ontario Greens Leader Mike Schreiner have both come out firmly against the proposal.
What FOI Actually Does
Freedom-of-information laws exist for exactly this kind of moment. They give journalists, opposition researchers, academics, and ordinary citizens the ability to request records from government, and they force officials to either produce those records or explain why they won’t.
In Ontario, FOI requests have helped expose how the government spent money on advertising, how decisions were made about expanding for-profit clinics, and the paper trail behind the Greenbelt land swap, one of the most controversial political controversies in recent provincial history.
If the premier and cabinet are carved out of those rules, that entire accountability mechanism disappears at the very top.
The Government’s Move
The Ford government has framed the changes as a modernization effort. But the timing, with active FOI requests pending on sensitive files, has led critics to argue this is less about modernization and more about insulation.
The proposal will face significant opposition before any vote, but the government holds a majority at Queen’s Park.
Source: CBC News
