Alberta’s Conflicts of Interest Amendment Act, 2017 creates a new statutory regime for members, employees, senior officials and designated senior officials of many public agencies. It requires agencies to establish public codes of conduct and gives the Ethics Commissioner a formal review, reporting and investigation role.
The bill also applies more demanding rules to designated senior officials, including restrictions on publicly traded securities, mandatory financial disclosures, limits on concurrent employment and a 12-month post-employment cooling-off period. It shifts overlapping rules for agency leaders out of the Public Service Act and into the Conflicts of Interest Act.
At a Glance
What It Does
The bill adds Part 4.3 to Alberta’s Conflicts of Interest Act. It requires covered public agencies to create codes of conduct, establishes statutory duties for senior officials, and gives the Ethics Commissioner authority to review codes, investigate alleged breaches and report non-compliance. Designated senior officials face additional requirements involving securities, disclosure statements, associated persons, outside work and post-employment activity. Former designated senior officials may face a fine of up to $50,000 for violating the cooling-off rules.
Who It Affects
The framework covers agencies governed by the Alberta Public Agencies Governance Act, Covenant Health, regional health authorities and subsidiary health corporations, plus other bodies designated by order. It generally covers agency chairs, chief executive officers, members, employees and positions designated by the Lieutenant Governor in Council. The bill also affects the Ethics Commissioner, responsible ministers, agency boards and staff, former agency executives, lobbyists and businesses seeking contracts or benefits from covered agencies.
Why It Matters
The legislation extends conflict-of-interest controls beyond elected officials and the core public service into Alberta’s broader public-agency network. It replaces a largely agency-level code model with a common statutory baseline and centralized Ethics Commissioner oversight. The bill also creates a direct bridge between conflict rules and lobbying, procurement, securities holdings and access-to-information treatment. That makes the compliance consequences relevant after an official leaves office, not just while the person is serving.
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What This Bill Actually Does
The new Part 4.3 applies to a defined group of public agencies, including agencies under the Alberta Public Agencies Governance Act, Covenant Health and regional health authorities and their subsidiaries. The Lieutenant Governor in Council can add agencies or exclude agencies, positions or classes of positions by order.
The framework distinguishes ordinary senior officials—normally a chair or chief executive officer—from designated senior officials, who are selected positions subject to the most extensive obligations.
Every covered agency must prepare one or more codes of conduct for its members, employees, senior officials and designated senior officials. Each code must address impartiality, private interests, real and apparent conflicts, gifts, outside appointments and employment, complaints, investigations and responses to breaches.
The agency must submit its code to the Ethics Commissioner, make it public after approval and provide a notice period before implementation. Existing codes continue during the transition, but the new statutory rules ultimately displace inconsistent arrangements.Senior officials cannot participate in decisions that they know could advance their own private interests or those of directly associated persons or children.
They also cannot use their office to influence government or agency decisions for private purposes, misuse non-public information or fail to disclose a real or apparent conflict. Chief executive officers and other designated positions generally cannot hold outside employment or business interests unless the Ethics Commissioner approves the arrangement in writing, potentially with conditions.Designated senior officials face further controls.
After the applicable 60-day period, they generally cannot own or beneficially hold publicly traded securities unless the Ethics Commissioner approves retention, a blind trust or an investment arrangement. They must file initial and annual disclosure statements, report material changes within 30 days and file returns concerning directly associated persons, including a return when they leave the position.
The agency pays approved costs for disclosure work and for establishing or administering a blind trust or investment arrangement.For 12 months after leaving, a designated senior official cannot lobby public office holders, act on certain ongoing matters, seek contracts or benefits from an agency with which the official had direct and significant dealings, or accept employment or a board appointment with an organization involved in those dealings. The Ethics Commissioner can waive or shorten a restriction in specified circumstances, such as an open, impartial process or activity that does not create a conflict.
A breach is an offence carrying a possible fine of up to $50,000, and affected parties may seek restitution for financial gains.
The Five Things You Need to Know
The Lieutenant Governor in Council can designate additional public agencies, senior-official positions and designated senior-official positions, and can exempt agencies or positions from all or part of the regime.
A public agency’s code of conduct must address gifts, including maximum cash values for gifts from a single source within a year, as well as outside employment, complaint handling and implementation notice.
Designated senior officials must file a disclosure statement within 60 days of becoming subject to the regime and file an amending statement within 30 days after a material change.
The bill protects Ethics Commissioner records relating to designated senior officials’ disclosure statements from ordinary access under Alberta’s freedom-of-information framework, subject to the bill’s specific disclosure rules.
A former designated senior official who violates the 12-month post-employment restrictions can face a fine of up to $50,000, and a court may order restitution for financial gains connected to the offence.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
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Expands the Act’s scope and definitions
The bill adds public-agency integrity to the Act’s purpose and updates definitions for blind trusts, investment arrangements and spouses. It also makes existing statutory references work with the new Part 4.3.
The definitional changes matter because the new obligations depend on whether a person is a senior official, designated senior official, directly associated person or member of a covered agency.
Defines covered agencies and officials
These provisions establish the new regime’s boundaries. They cover specified public agencies and permit the Lieutenant Governor in Council to add or exclude bodies and positions by order. Chairs and chief executive officers are senior officials by default, while other positions become subject to the enhanced rules only when designated.
The distinction gives the executive branch flexibility to calibrate obligations by agency and role, but it also means the practical reach of the statute depends partly on later designations and exemptions.
Requires public codes of conduct
Every covered agency must prepare codes for its members, employees and applicable officials, submit them to the Ethics Commissioner and publish them after approval. The codes must cover impartiality, private interests, conflicts, gifts, outside work, complaints and responses to breaches.
The provision creates a common minimum standard while allowing an agency’s code to add detail suited to its operations. It also turns publication and implementation into compliance obligations rather than optional governance practices.
Creates Ethics Commissioner oversight of codes
The Ethics Commissioner can request codes, review them for compliance, report deficiencies to the responsible minister and agency leadership, and identify non-compliant agencies in the annual report. Agencies must submit initial codes within four months of the provision’s commencement, subject to possible administrative extensions, and unpublished codes after the statutory review milestones constitute a breach of the Part.
Existing codes remain in force to the extent they are consistent with the new framework until replacement. This avoids an immediate governance gap but creates a period in which agencies may operate under layered or partially inconsistent rules.
Sets duties for senior officials and outside work rules
Senior officials breach the Part if they participate in decisions advancing certain private interests, use their position or confidential information improperly, or fail to disclose a real or apparent conflict. Chief executive officers and specified chairs or office holders also face a general prohibition on concurrent employment or business activity unless the Ethics Commissioner gives written approval.
The approval power allows case-by-case flexibility, but it places the practical burden on officials to identify outside interests early and obtain written clearance before proceeding.
Regulates securities and financial disclosures
Designated senior officials must address publicly traded securities within the applicable 60-day period. They may seek approval to retain securities, use a blind trust or establish an approved investment arrangement, and they must obtain prior approval for later acquisitions in relevant circumstances.
The provisions also require initial, annual and amending disclosure statements, along with returns about directly associated persons. The Ethics Commissioner can impose administrative penalties for late filings, while agencies must reimburse approved disclosure and trust-related costs.
Imposes post-employment restrictions and penalties
For 12 months after leaving a designated position, former officials face restrictions on lobbying, ongoing matters, contracts and benefits involving agencies with which they had significant dealings, and employment or board appointments with organizations involved in those dealings. The restrictions do not block appointments to another public agency or employment with the public service or a public agency under the Public Service Act.
The Ethics Commissioner may waive or reduce a restriction in specified circumstances. Contraventions constitute an offence punishable by a fine of up to $50,000, and the Court of Queen’s Bench may order restitution where a transaction produced financial gain.
Establishes investigations, confidentiality and transition rules
The Ethics Commissioner receives investigation powers and procedures adapted from the existing Act, but may defer or suspend an investigation while agency, human-resources or collective-agreement processes are used. Reports may go to the official, agency leadership, the responsible minister and, where appropriate, law-enforcement authorities.
The Part also protects specified records, provides transition rules for existing contracts and codes, prevents claims for constructive dismissal or compensation based on the new regime, and authorizes regulations to fill in definitions, code requirements and transitional issues.
Coordinates related statutes
The bill repeals the Alberta Public Agencies Governance Act provision that separately required public-agency codes of conduct. It amends the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act to address records concerning designated officials’ disclosures and updates the Lobbyists Act so designated officials and former designated officials fit within its public-office-holder framework.
It also removes overlapping public-agency office-holder provisions from the Public Service Act and adjusts related reporting, investigation and interim-code rules. Sections 2 and 5 come into force on proclamation, creating a separate commencement mechanism for those consequential amendments.
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Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Public-agency users and Albertans who rely on impartial decisions benefit from a common baseline for conflicts, gifts, outside employment and confidential information across major agencies.
- Agency boards and responsible ministers gain a clearer escalation path when codes are missing, deficient or breached, including Ethics Commissioner reports and annual-report visibility.
- The Ethics Commissioner gains explicit authority to review codes, approve certain securities and outside-work arrangements, investigate alleged breaches and coordinate referrals to other processes.
- Businesses and lobbyists interacting with covered agencies receive clearer post-employment boundaries for former agency executives, reducing uncertainty about when prior relationships create a prohibited advantage.
- Senior officials who must restructure investments or comply with cooling-off rules receive statutory reimbursement for approved disclosure work and blind-trust or investment-arrangement costs.
Who Bears the Cost
- Covered public agencies must draft, revise, publish and administer codes of conduct, respond to Ethics Commissioner oversight and pay approved compliance and legal-cost reimbursements.
- Designated senior officials face personal compliance costs, securities restrictions, recurring disclosures, limits on outside work and a 12-month loss of commercial flexibility after leaving office.
- Agency human-resources, legal and governance teams must coordinate complaints, investigations, disclosure handling and transition from existing Public Service Act or agency-specific regimes.
- The Ethics Commissioner’s office assumes additional review, approval, investigation, reporting and records-management responsibilities, with administrative capacity becoming a practical constraint.
- Former officials and organizations that seek to hire them or transact with their former agencies may need to delay, restructure or obtain a waiver for lobbying, employment, contracts or benefits.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The bill tries to preserve public confidence without making public-agency leadership impossible to staff or operate. Strong investment, disclosure and post-employment restrictions reduce opportunities for private influence, but they also limit officials’ financial and professional freedom and require agencies to manage sensitive personal information. The central question is how much flexibility should remain for officials and agencies when the public cannot easily observe whether that flexibility is being used responsibly.
The bill creates a broad framework, but its actual reach is not fully self-executing. The Lieutenant Governor in Council controls many designations and exemptions, while the Ethics Commissioner and future regulations determine important operational details.
That flexibility can tailor rules to different agencies, but it can also produce uneven coverage and uncertainty about which positions require the enhanced regime.
The disclosure and confidentiality model presents a second trade-off. The bill demands information about officials, securities and associated persons, yet keeps much of the Ethics Commissioner’s working record confidential and limits public identification in annual reporting.
That may protect personal privacy and investigative integrity, but it also reduces the amount of information outsiders can use to assess compliance.
Enforcement is similarly layered. The Ethics Commissioner can investigate and recommend, agencies can use internal or collective-agreement processes, and only post-employment violations receive the express criminal fine and restitution mechanism in this Part.
The model avoids forcing every workplace dispute into a single process, but it leaves the practical consequences of many on-the-job breaches dependent on agency action, employment rules and the Ethics Commissioner’s recommendations.
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