Many Alberta workers in regulated professions could no longer be investigated by their licensing bodies for what they say outside of work hours, should the legislature pass a new bill.
Justice Minister Mickey Amery introduced the Regulated Professions Neutrality Act, also called Bill 13, in the legislature on Thursday, a year after saying the government was scrutinizing regulators for overreach affecting free speech.
“When regulators begin disciplining people for simply speaking their mind on their own time, that’s overreach — and at its worst, becomes an outright threat to free expression,” Premier Danielle Smith said at a news conference Thursday morning.
Health law experts say such rules would exacerbate the spread of medical misinformation and put professional regulation in Alberta offside with the rest of the country.
“It’s going to limit the ability of the professional regulators to protect the public,” said Lorian Hardcastle, an associate professor of law and medicine at the University of Calgary.
Smith dubbed the legislation “the Peterson bill,” referring to psychologist Jordan Peterson, who was sanctioned in 2022 by the College of Psychologists of Ontario for statements he made online that it said may be “degrading ” and called the profession into disrepute.
The college ordered Peterson to take social media training, which he appealed to the courts, until the Supreme Court of Canada declined to hear his case.
If passed, Bill 13 would also limit what types of training could be mandated by regulatory bodies for their members. According to background information about the legislation, regulators couldn’t require “cultural competency, unconscious bias, or diversity, equity and inclusion training” to be mandatory.
Training about political, historic, social or cultural issues could only be required if it’s necessary for the worker’s competence or ethics, the background information says.
The bill would allow regulatory bodies to discipline members’ behaviour outside of work in limited circumstances, such as when a person is threatening violence, shows intent to harm an identifiable person, misconduct or sexual misconduct that crosses professional boundaries, or sexual or improper communications to a minor.
The bill would apply to more than 100 regulated professions, including lawyers, engineers, nurses, teachers, doctors, architects, accountants and accredited tradespeople.
The government did not have information by publication time about how much time regulatory bodies will have to adapt their bylaws and training requirements, or when a law would take effect, if passed.
Push came from UCP members
In 2023, United Conservative Party members voted to adopt a resolution to limit professional disciplinary investigations to activities on the job and exclude workers’ professional lives from codes of conduct.
Last year, Smith said regulatory colleges had “gone too far” in policing members’ public statements, and pledged to bring in legislation to change that.
Smith told reporters on Thursday she’s heard from doctors who fear publicly supporting the government’s ban on puberty blockers and gender-affirming hormone treatment for children younger than 16 because of potential discipline from the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta.
Timothy Caulfield, a University of Alberta health law professor who has authored books and hosted a Netflix series on misinformation, said the government is fostering the notion that there are “brave voices that were silenced by the overreach of regulators,” particularly during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Caulfield said research shows the opposite is true — that investigating medical professionals accused of providing misinformation makes up a tiny proportion of cases before health regulators.
“We know that health misinformation does grave, grave harm, especially if it comes from health-care professionals,” he said.
Being a regulated professional is a privilege that affords power but also should come with responsibility, he said.
Hardcastle said the opinions of a person with a professional designation carry more weight, which is why unexpected claims from doctors or nurses will be further amplified online.
“This puts us in a dramatically different position than the rest of the country,” she said of professional regulation.
Regulatory bodies mandating anti-racism training and similar education is also for the protection of the public, Hardcastle said.
Research shows patients of some ethnicities broadly have received worse health care, and may have worse outcomes from medical treatment, she said.
Professions have often been left to govern their peers because they know the field best, Hardcastle said, adding that she believes this legislation is substantial overreach.
Smith said scientific knowledge and evidence evolves with time, and best practices change. She said she’s more fearful of debate being stifled than having information spread that later is proven to be wrong.
Bill perpetuates myths, says equity trainer
Marcie Hawranik, founder and CEO of Calgary-based Canadian Equality Consulting, said in an interview on Thursday that she’s disappointed to see the government mischaracterize diversity and inclusion training.
Education about different cultures and unconscious bias helps improve communication and prevents conflict and errors in workplaces, she said. She added that she believes it should be regulators, not the government, deciding when professionals need that education.
“One of the many reasons why these independent regulatory bodies exist is to keep politics out of professional practice,” Hawranik said.
Alberta NDP justice critic Irfan Sabir said the bill is disturbing because it opens the door for people to say racist or hateful things without consequence in an increasingly multicultural society.
“As usual, the government has not consulted,” he said. “No one was asking for it other than the UCP’s own fringe base.”
A spokesperson for the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta said the organization will need time to understand the implications of the bill, particularly on how it will fulfil its mandate.
Elizabeth J. Osler, CEO and executive director of the Law Society of Alberta, provided CBC News with a statement about the proposed legislation on Thursday, noting the organization “has a duty to protect the public interest in the regulation of legal services.”
The organization will thoroughly review the new legislation to “fully understand what it means for the Law Society [of Alberta], the public and the legal profession in Alberta,” Osler said.
