Ontario Premier Doug Ford's administration failed to maintain adequate record-keeping practices during a controversial Greenbelt housing policy shift. Information and Privacy Commissioner Patricia Kosseim found that political staff employed code words to obscure communications, reducing accountability and complicating the retrieval of critical documents. This disregard for documentation raises significant concerns over governmental transparency, with Kosseim noting the detrimental impact on public trust. The employment of vague terminology, such as 'G..', hindered systematic searches and compliance with legal obligations, underscoring systemic issues within the province's governance frameworks.
"The Greenbelt-related appeals offer a clear example and cautionary tale about the consequences of inadequate recordkeeping. When key government decisions are not properly documented, transparency suffers, and with it, public trust."
"Staffers sometimes referred to the Greenbelt project in messages as 'special project,' or 'GB,' or 'G..,' with references to G.. being next to impossible to find. Those terms and their inconsistent use made it 'unduly difficult' to search for Greenbelt-related records."
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