Canadian Government’s AI consultation sparks strong ppposition from civil society groups
In an open letter to Ministers Mélanie Joly and Evan Solomon, more than 100 organisations and experts call for a longer consultation period, a more representative task force, and a rewritten survey free of leading language. They argue that Canada’s AI strategy demands careful engagement on issues ranging from labour exploitation and algorithmic discrimination to privacy risks and environmental impacts.
Civil society groups in Canada have issued an open letter rejecting the federal government’s current public consultation on a new national AI strategy. The letter, sent to Industry Minister Mélanie Joly, Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation Minister Evan Solomon, and the AI Strategy Task Force at Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada, argues that the government’s 30-day ‘National Sprint’ consultation is inadequate and risks producing an AI strategy that lacks public legitimacy.
The signatories, a broad coalition of civil society organisations, academics, human-rights advocates and community representatives, say the process is structurally flawed. Their concerns focus on the short timeline, the survey’s framing, and what they describe as an overemphasis on economic and industry priorities at the expense of human-rights protections. They also argue that the task force overseeing the consultation is missing representation from communities most affected by AI-related harms. The letter proposes three changes: extending the consultation deadline to 2 February 2026, redesigning the task force to be more representative, and revising the consultation survey to remove leading language.
The submission outlines a wide set of documented risks linked to AI systems, including labour exploitation, socioeconomic inequality, environmental impacts of data-centre infrastructure, Indigenous data sovereignty concerns, algorithmic discrimination, gender-based violence enabled by deepfakes, threats to LGBTQ2SIA+ communities, mental-health risks, privacy violations, and reliability failures that contribute to a declining information environment. The signatories argue that these issues require careful, expert-informed discussion and cannot be addressed meaningfully under the current timeline.
Instead of participating in what they describe as ‘pseudo-consultation,’ the groups will run an independent People’s Consultation on AI, promising to publish submissions on 2 February 2026. The letter is endorsed by dozens of Canadian civil-society organisations, research institutes, labour groups, women’s rights organisations, digital-rights advocates and hundreds of academics and experts.
