I’m a pediatric neurologist. Over four months in 2026, I wrote 16 parallel letters via email to the Alberta and federal governments on eight public policy topics. The letters were individually written, evidence-based and non-partisan, but relevant to current political discourse in Alberta.
What I observed were four patterns that raised concerns about structural governance failure. Across all party lines and levels of government, elected officials and their offices appeared to avoid substantive engagement in a consistent and similar manner.
It’s worth understanding these patterns as the first step towards improving public trust in democratic accountability.
Read more:
Power to the people: How Canada can build a more connected and responsive Parliament
The parliamentary system in the United Kingdom has official guidelines describing this issue and a requirement for a substantive ministerial response within 20 working days.
Municipal offices in Ontario follow this standard. Provincial and federal offices do not. I received a response on the federal climate file 111 days after the original letter.
A 30-day requirement would therefore be a reasonable standard for both federal and provincial governments to adopt.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn
Shunting and stonewalling
The first pattern I encountered after sending my emails was bureaucratic shunting. Correspondence was bounced among departments without an identified respondent. Sometimes, routing decisions were not clearly communicated.
An email I sent on vaccination to Prime Minister Mark Carney moved through the Minister of Health, Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) and Health Canada over nine weeks. When I corrected an off-topic response from PHAC, Health Canada reissued the original response unchanged. Sixteen days later, PHAC sent an unsolicited follow-up that addressed the topic but not the original questions.
The second pattern was administrative stonewalling.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh
The Prime Minister’s Office used my email’s CC list, stating the matter was “left to be considered” by the ministers I had copied. That language appeared nearly verbatim on three separate occasions.
Similarly, an email I sent on Alberta’s social determinants of health file was forwarded “for consideration” to the Minister of Affordability. These appeared to be template responses absolving any one office from replying.
Substitution and silence
The third apparent approach was narrative substitution and evidence reframing. Responses arrived but political language was used instead of responding to questions.
Scientific evidence was implied without reference, or cited evidence was misrepresented. Alberta’s Ministry of Health described vaccine safety as a matter of respecting “the views of Albertans,” treating scientific consensus as equivalent to personal opinion.
My question regarding the government’s actions to improve vaccine uptake was ignored.
The Alberta Ministry of Mental Health and Addiction, meanwhile, cited a study to justify closing supervised drug consumption sites.
However, the response failed to acknowledge a statistically significant increase in inpatient admissions following closure of the sites, the researchers’ own cautions not to over-interpret their findings and that the study was conducted by researchers affiliated with the Canadian Centre of Recovery Excellence, which is funded by the same government that ordered the closures.
The fourth response was managed silence. When the topic left respondents politically exposed or I sent a correction, the system defaulted to no response or repetition.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick
On the federal Canada Health Act file, two contacts produced no response. Yet federal Heath Minister Marjorie Michel spoke to the media on April 28 on this exact topic.
On the Alberta climate file, two correspondences resulted in persistent silence from the Ministry of Environment and Protected Areas and two responses from the Minister of Affordability that failed to address the questions asked. On evidence-based governance, the provincial government responded with a repeat list of existing programs and there was an off-topic response from the PMO stating that “the Prime Minister values feedback and suggestions.”
What I learned
Correspondence sent to the federal governments produced more rerouting, template responses and silence. Letters to the Alberta government resulted in more narrative substitution and evidence reframing.
The one substantive, on-topic, response with commitment was from Alberta opposition MLA Sarah Elmeligi on the climate file. The New Democrat, — who is not in government, of course — described specific parliamentary activity and constituent impacts from renewable sector job losses in her riding.
She showed that engagement is possible. That level of specific commitment I observed only once in the campaign.
Potential solutions
This is unacceptable. Canada should establish minimum response standards for constituent correspondence. When a constituent’s letter is forwarded to another ministry, the originating office should confirm who is responsible and when to expect a reply.
Parliamentary petition tracking is already public. It makes sense that the volume and response rates for ministerial constituent correspondence should be publicly reported as well. This would give citizens a basis for evaluating institutional responsiveness over time.
The response from Alberta’s Ministry of Mental Health and Addiction shows that citing evidence alone is not enough to ensure evidence-based policymaking. Responses should require acknowledgement of scientific consensus and must justify or explain any deviation from it.
Canada is perfectly positioned to lead this. The office of the Chief Science Advisor of Canada already exists, and expanding its legislative mandate to include a non-partisan mechanism for evidence review is worth considering.
Canadians deserve responsive elected officials. Right now, based on my experiences, that responsiveness seems to be missing. The problem can be fixed, but only if it’s recognized instead of accepted as normal.
