This bill amends the Missing Persons Act, 2018 to add a new statutory category—"vulnerable persons"—and to authorize a specific kind of public safety notice called a vulnerable persons alert. The amendment defines who counts as a vulnerable person (age, disability, dependency or elevated risk from a person in a position of trust) and creates a mechanism for a police officer to request that the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) issue such an alert.
Practically, the OPP may only issue a vulnerable persons alert if it already has authority to issue AMBER alerts, and the requesting officer must have descriptive information and reasonable grounds that an alert will help locate the person. The bill also requires the province’s annual missing persons report to include counts of vulnerable persons alerts requested and, in the case of the OPP, issued—adding a transparency metric without prescribing distribution channels or operational protocols.
At a Glance
What It Does
Creates a new statutory alert—"vulnerable persons alert"—and permits an officer to request the OPP to issue one when certain criteria are met (belief the person is vulnerable, descriptive information exists, and reasonable grounds the alert will help). The OPP can only issue the alert if it already has AMBER-alert authority.
Who It Affects
Municipal and provincial police services (requesting and coordination duties), the OPP (gatekeeper for issuance), agencies and families involved in searches for missing vulnerable adults or other dependent persons, and the ministry that publishes the annual missing persons report.
Why It Matters
The change fills a statutory gap for non-child high-risk missing-person cases by putting a formal, reportable alert power on the books. It creates new operational obligations for police and a new transparency measure for provincial reporting, while leaving distribution methods and detailed criteria to operational policy rather than statute.
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What This Bill Actually Does
The bill adds a legal definition of "vulnerable person" to the Missing Persons Act: someone who, because of age, disability or other circumstances, is dependent on others or is at greater risk of harm from a person in a position of trust or authority. That wording intentionally covers both long-term vulnerability (for example, cognitive impairment or disability) and temporary states (for example, injury or acute medical need), and it connects vulnerability to the relational risk posed by trusted caregivers or authority figures.
It then creates section 6.1, which lets an "officer" (defined by the Act) request that the Ontario Provincial Police issue a vulnerable persons alert. The request must be grounded in three elements: the officer’s belief the missing person meets the vulnerability test, the officer must have descriptive information about the vulnerable person or another person likely to know their whereabouts, and the officer must have reasonable grounds to think an alert will assist in locating them.
A request can specify geographic region(s) in Ontario where circulation would be most effective.The OPP is the issuing authority if, and only if, it "also has the authority to issue an AMBER alert." The bill therefore ties the new alert’s operational reach to the existing legal/operational framework for AMBER alerts rather than giving every police service an independent statutory power to push out this type of notice. Finally, the Act’s reporting section is amended so the province’s annual missing persons report must state how many vulnerable persons alerts were requested each year and how many the OPP issued, making usage visible but not mandating performance metrics or distribution channels.
The bill comes into force on royal assent and sets the short title.
The Five Things You Need to Know
The bill defines "vulnerable person" to include those dependent on others or at greater risk of harm from someone in a position of trust or authority.
Section 6.1 allows an officer to request a vulnerable persons alert only if the officer believes the person is vulnerable, has descriptive information, and reasonably expects the alert will help locate them.
A request may name specific Ontario region(s) where the alert should be circulated, giving requesting officers geographic discretion.
The OPP may issue the alert under the bill only when it already has legal authority to issue AMBER alerts—creating a jurisdictional gatekeeping condition.
The province’s annual missing persons report must include how many vulnerable persons alerts were requested each year and, for the OPP, how many were actually issued.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
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New statutory definition of "vulnerable person"
This provision inserts a definition that covers people who are dependent on others or who face elevated risk from someone in a position of trust or authority, and it explicitly captures both temporary and permanent circumstances. The language is broad by design: it imports relational risk (trust/authority) rather than limiting vulnerability to specific diagnoses or age brackets, which gives police discretion but also raises questions about consistent application.
Adds vulnerable persons alerts to list of alerts
By inserting a new paragraph into the definition of what constitutes an "alert" under the Act, the bill ensures vulnerable persons alerts count as official alerts for purposes of the statute. That change makes them subject to the Act’s governance and reporting structure, rather than leaving them solely to ad hoc local practice.
Officer request process and OPP issuing condition
This is the operational core: an officer may request the OPP issue the alert if three tests are met (belief in vulnerability, descriptive information, and reasonable grounds that an alert will help). The request can indicate target region(s). Critically, the OPP’s authority to issue is conditional—only when it "also has the authority to issue an AMBER alert"—which links the new tool to existing AMBER governance and may limit issuance where AMBER criteria are not met.
Reporting: count of requests and OPP-issued alerts
This amendment requires the annual report to include the total number of vulnerable persons alerts requested each year and the total number issued by the OPP. It creates a basic transparency metric so policymakers and the public can see usage, but it does not require outcome data (e.g., recoveries) or details about municipal issuance decisions.
Commencement on royal assent and short title
The bill takes effect when it receives royal assent and adopts the short title Missing Persons Amendment Act, 2023. There are no staged implementation dates or transitional provisions, so operational practices and reporting changes would need to be implemented promptly once in force.
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Explore this topic in Codify Search →Who Benefits and Who Bears the Cost
Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Missing vulnerable people and their families: Establishes a formal statutory avenue to mobilize public attention for non-child high-risk missing cases, potentially accelerating searches when time is critical.
- Municipal police services and officers conducting searches: Gives officers a clear legal pathway to request public alerts and to nominate geographic targets for circulation, clarifying an operational tool that may previously have been informal.
- Advocacy groups serving seniors and people with disabilities: The statutory definition recognizes dependence and relational risk, which can validate calls for urgent public attention and tailor protections for these populations.
Who Bears the Cost
- Ontario Provincial Police: Must apply the AMBER-authority gate to requests, likely adding a case-by-case review workload and operational decisions about issuance; the OPP will also be the entity counted separately in reporting.
- Municipal police services and frontline officers: Will need to develop criteria, training, and internal processes to decide when to request an alert and to prepare the descriptive information and geographic recommendations required by the statute.
- Ministry responsible for the missing persons report: Faces an expanded reporting duty to collect and publish counts of requests and OPP-issued alerts, which requires data collection and validation across multiple police services.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The bill balances two legitimate aims—expanding public-warning tools to protect non-child vulnerable people versus keeping tight operational and jurisdictional controls to limit unnecessary public alerts—and does so by delegating most substantive choices to police practice; that delegation solves flexibility needs but invites inconsistency, workload concentration at the OPP, and unanswered questions about accountability and effectiveness.
The bill purposely leaves key operational choices to police practice rather than prescribing distribution channels, thresholds, or publicity methods. That grants flexibility—local services can tailor alerts to their media ecosystems—but it also means the statute does not standardize who else (broadcasters, digital platforms, provincial alert systems) must act or how.
The OPP’s conditional issuing power (tied to AMBER authority) creates a procedural choke point: where the OPP lacks AMBER authority or deems the AMBER threshold unmet, municipal services may end up unable to trigger the statutory alert even when they believe it necessary.
The statutory definition of "vulnerable person" is intentionally broad ("other circumstances", "position of trust or authority"), which helps capture diverse at-risk situations but risks inconsistent interpretation across services. "Reasonable grounds" and the officer’s belief standard are subjective; without accompanying protocol guidance, different police services could apply widely different thresholds, producing geographic unevenness and potential disputes with families or oversight bodies. Lastly, the new reporting obligation improves transparency on usage counts but stops short of tracking outcomes, timeliness, or false positives, limiting the ability to evaluate effectiveness or unintended harms such as public desensitization.
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