Ontario privacy watchdog to issue special report on deleted Greenbelt e-mails

Ontario’s information and privacy watchdog plans to issue a special report on allegations that senior provincial government officials deleted important e-mails and used personal e-mail addresses or coded language to attempt to evade scrutiny during their now-reversed rush to approve housing on parts of the ecologically sensitive Greenbelt.

Information and Privacy Commissioner Patricia Kosseim says her office intends to provide “conclusions and insights into the access-to-information and record-keeping issues relating to changes to the Greenbelt.”

But Ms. Kosseim says her report won’t be released until after the resolution of the 19 active freedom-of-information appeals related to the Greenbelt, in which media outlets or other requesters have challenged government refusals to provide records related to the scandal. She did not provide a date for her special report.

The aborted Greenbelt plan is already under criminal investigation by the RCMP, after reports by the Auditor-General and the Integrity Commissioner last year concluded that a secretive, rushed process to open up parts of the protected area had favoured a small group of connected developers, handing them an estimated $8.3-billion windfall in increased property values.

Those revelations prompted the departure of two cabinet ministers and four key political aides before Premier Doug Ford abandoned the Greenbelt plans last fall.

Ms. Kosseim’s pledge to issue her own report on the Greenbelt was made in a May 21 letter responding to a request from Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles, who had asked her to probe allegations that senior aides in Mr. Ford’s government working on the Greenbelt plan had tried to avoid freedom-of-information legislation. The Auditor-General’s report had also previously raised concerns about deleted e-mails and the use of personal e-mail accounts for government business.

Ms. Stiles, the leader of the Official Opposition, has provided the commissioner with documents showing some government officials used codewords, such as “G*” instead of the word Greenbelt in e-mails, and said that Mr. Ford was using his personal cellphone for government business yet keeping his phone records secret.

On Monday, she pointed to a report from Global News alleging that e-mails it had obtained show Mr. Ford’s chief-of-staff, Patrick Sackville, used personal e-mail accounts for government business – despite previously telling the province’s Integrity Commissioner under oath that he had not. Ms. Stiles demanded Mr. Sackville’s resignation.

Ms. Stiles said it was a similar report from the Information and Privacy Commissioner on the wiping of hard drives containing e-mails about the cancellation of two natural-gas plants in 2013 that prompted the police probe that would end up putting then-Liberal premier Dalton McGuinty’s former chief-of-staff, David Livingstone, in jail.

She noted that Mr. Ford did not rise to answer the questions she raised in the legislature.

“We will not stop asking the Premier to be accountable. He doesn’t have the guts to stand up and answer those questions when I ask him those questions,” Ms. Stiles told reporters after Question Period. “I think he’s scared.”

Neither Mr. Sackville nor a spokeswoman for the Premier’s Office responded to requests for comment on Monday before deadline.

In the House, Progressive Conservative House Leader Paul Calandra rose to respond to the NDP’s questions instead of the Premier, saying the government would continue to work with the Information and Privacy Commissioner and the Integrity Commissioner.

Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie condemned the use of personal e-mails for government business.

“What we’ve seen is government by Gmail. And these Gmails, their Gmail addresses, should be made available to the Integrity Commissioner. The deleted e-mails should be recovered, and evaluated and analyzed,” Ms. Crombie told reporters.

Asked last week about the use of personal e-mails for government business, Mr. Ford said personal e-mail should not be used, “plain and simple.”