Mandate letters issued to Ontario cabinet ministers can remain confidential and are not subject to freedom of information requests, the Supreme Court has ruled.
The saga goes back to 2018 when a CBC journalist requested access through provincial freedom of information laws to the mandate letters Premier Doug Ford sent to cabinet ministers. Mandate letters are documents outlining ministerial priorities. Some governments opt to release them proactively, but the Ford government did not and fought against disclosure through the freedom of information process.
The Ford government claimed the letters were protected by cabinet confidence as they would reveal the “substance of deliberations.”
CBC appealed the refusal to disclose to the Information and Privacy Commissioner, which rejected the Ontario government’s characterization that the mandate letters were exempt from disclosure.
The decision by the privacy commissioner to order the release of the letters was upheld on judicial review and at the Court of Appeal for Ontario, but these decisions were overturned by Friday’s Supreme Court decision.
The Supreme Court found that mandate letters aren’t simply a list of priorities but touch on matters of substance that are protected by cabinet confidence.
“Far from being mere ‘topics’ like items on an agenda, the Letters reflect the views of the Premier on the importance of certain policy priorities, and mark the initiative of a fluid process of policy formulation within Cabinet,” the decision says.
“The Letters are revealing of the substance of Cabinet deliberations, both on their face and when compared against what government actually does.”
The Supreme Court decision was unanimous.
