Overview
- Ontario’s premier said keeping his personal cellphone records secret protects constituent privacy and cabinet confidentiality, adding the changes align with other jurisdictions.
- Ford acknowledged the clamp-down targets calls on personal devices, saying cabinet conversations on personal cellphones should not be subject to freedom-of-information requests.
- The plan would exclude records of the premier, cabinet ministers and their staff — including calls, texts, emails and schedules — from disclosure under FOI on a retroactive basis.
- A court panel in January upheld the privacy commissioner’s order to release Ford’s personal call logs, while the commissioner now condemns the proposed exemptions as moving the goal posts.
- Opposition leaders accuse the government of evading accountability, and the province has not disclosed what the multi-year legal fight over the phone records has cost taxpayers.