Public Health Emergencies Governance Review Panel

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Panel mandate

The Public Health Emergencies Governance Review Panel will examine:

• whether there are ways the government should amend legislation to improve:
  • the quality and breadth of the medical advice used in responding to future public health emergencies
  • communications with the public during such emergencies
• whether there are more effective ways to implement health protection measures in response to a public health emergency while:
  • limiting negative impacts on the health, mental and social well-being, and civil liberties of Albertans
  • avoiding negative impacts to the economy

Documents

• Ministerial Order 01/2023 and Terms of Reference (PDF, 186 KB)
• Ministerial Order 04/2023 (PDF, 437 KB)
• Ministerial Order 06/2023 (PDF, 21.5 KB)

Topics to review

In conducting the review, the panel will look at various aspects of responses to public health emergencies, including:

• general public health and health information
• mental health and wellness
• child and student health, mental health and education
• health professionals’ practice standards
• effective implementation of emergency measures
• protection of rights and freedoms
• economic and financial effects
• employment standards

Legislation to review

The panel will review the following legislation:

• Public Health Act
• Emergency Management Act
• Alberta Human Rights Act
• Health Information Act
• Personal Information Protection Act
• Employment Standards Code
• Health Professions Act
• Education Act

Reporting

The panel will provide its:

• interim report and recommendations to government by June 30, 2023.
• final report and recommendations to government by November 15, 2023.

Panel members

Preston Manning (Chair)

Mr. Manning’s long record of public service includes work as the founder of both the Reform Party of Canada and later the Canadian Reform Conservative Alliance, as a Member of Parliament from Calgary Southwest from 1993 to 2001, and as the Leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition from 1997 to 2000.

In 2007, he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada and in 2013 was appointed to the Privy Council. After leaving Parliament in 2001, Mr. Manning founded and led 2 non-profit organizations, the Manning Foundation for Democratic Education and the Manning Centre for Building Democracy.

He has written 5 books and continues to write, lecture and consult on subjects such as western Canadian populism, the natural resource sectors as fundamental building blocks of the Canadian economy, health care reform, alternative responses to public emergencies, and the application of science to public policy.

Martha Fulford

Dr. Fulford is an associate professor at McMaster University. She is currently the retired chief of medicine at the McMaster University Medical Centre of Hamilton Health Sciences. Dr. Fulford provides infectious disease consultations for both the pediatric and adult patient populations as well as running the McMaster Travel Clinic.

She completed her training in internal medicine and in infectious diseases at McMaster University with a particular interest in travel related infections. She is a member of the Provincial Infectious Diseases Advisory Committee’s Communicable Diseases Committee with Public Health Ontario.

Michel Kelly-Gagnon

Michel Kelly-Gagnon was the president of the Montreal Economic Institute from 1999 to 2006. He was president of the Quebec Employers Council until January 2009. He’s been back at the helm of the Montreal Economic Institute since January 2009.

He has a degree in law from the Université de Montréal and early in his career he practiced law with Colas & Associates in Montreal.

He was one of 6 people from Quebec honoured in Canada’s Top 40 Under 40™ 2008 awards. In 2010, the Canadian Minister of Industry appointed Mr. Kelly-Gagnon to the Board of Directors of the Canada Foundation for Innovation, an independent corporation which supports world-class research and technology development. He is also actively involved in the board of directors of the Fondation Universitaire Pierre Arbour and the John W. Dobson Foundation. Mr. Kelly-Gagnon is a member of the Mont Pelerin Society.

Former Justice John C. Major

Mr. John (Jack) C. Major is a retired judge of the Supreme Court of Canada and has helped to shape the legal landscape in Canada through his years as a lawyer, judge and counsel.

He earned his LL.B. from the University of Toronto in 1957 and a B.Comm. from Loyola College (Montreal) in 1953. He has honourary LLD degrees from Concordia University (Montreal), the University of Calgary and the University of Toronto.

In March 2006, he was appointed to the Alberta Securities Commission as an independent member and, in May 2006, he was appointed as commissioner to conduct an inquiry into the investigation of the bombing of Air India Flight 182.

On July 11, 1991, he was appointed to the Alberta Court of Appeal. The following year, on November 13, 1992, he was appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada. During his time with the Supreme Court of Canada, he presided over approximately 1000 cases on matters ranging from assisted suicide to the death penalty to Quebec separation.

He has also served as counsel to the Canadian Medical Protective Association (Alberta), counsel for the City of Calgary Police Service, counsel at the CCB and Northland Bank (Estey Commission) and was counsel for the Province of Alberta at the Code Inquiry into the collapse of Principal Group of Companies, 1987 and in constitutional cases before the Supreme Court of Canada.

He is the recipient of the Canadian Bar Association’s 2015 President’s Award. This prestigious award recognizes the significant contribution of a Canadian jurist to the legal profession, to the CBA, or to the public life of Canada. He is a member of the Canadian Institute for the Administration of Justice and the Canadian Judges Conference. He was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1972, and was appointed a Companion of the Order of Canada in July 2008.

Jack Mintz

Dr. Jack M. Mintz is the president’s fellow of the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary after serving as the Palmer Chair and founding director from January 1, 2008, to June 30, 2015.

He chaired the Alberta Premier’s Economic Recovery Council. He also serves on the board of Imperial Oil Limited and Alberta Health Services. He is a distinguished senior fellow, MacDonald-Laurier Institute, senior fellow at the C.D. Howe Institute, and research fellow at International Tax and Investment Centre in Washington D.C., CESIfo Germany and Oxford’s Centre of Business Taxation. He is also a regulator contributor to the Financial Post and is a member of the editorial board of International Tax and Public Finance.

Dr. Mintz held the position of professor of business economics at the Rotman School of Business from 1989 to 2007 and Department of Economics at Queen’s University, Kingston, from 1978 to 1989. He was a visiting professor at Columbia Law School in 2015 and New York University Law School in 2007, president and CEO of the C. D. Howe Institute from 1999 to 2006, Clifford Clark visiting economist at the Department of Finance in Ottawa, and associate dean (academic) of the Faculty of Management at the University of Toronto from 1993 to1995. He was founding editor-in-chief of International Tax and Public Finance, published by Kluwer Academic Publishers from 1994 to 2001.

He chaired the federal government’s Technical Committee on Business Taxation in 1996 and 1997 that led to corporate tax reform in Canada since 2000. He also served on numerous panels and boards at the federal and provincial levels including vice-president and chair of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council from 2012 to 2018, chair of the Alberta Financial Investment and Planning Advisory Commission in 2007, and member of the federal Panel on Healthcare Innovation 2014 to 2015.

In the past he served on corporate boards including Brookfield Asset Management (2002 to 2012), Morneau Shepell (2010 to 2020) and CHC Helicopter (2003 to 2008). He has consulted widely with the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, and various governments, businesses, and non-profit organizations in Canada and abroad, including serving as National Policy Advisor for EY Canada from 2015 to 2021.

Dr. Mintz became a member of the Order of Canada in 2015 as well as receiving the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2012 for service to the Canadian tax policy community. He has been recognized by Who’s Who Legal as one of the top global experts on corporate taxation since 2016.

Rob Tanguay

Dr. Tanguay is a psychiatrist who completed 2 fellowships, one in addiction medicine and one in pain medicine. He is a clinical assistant professor with the departments of psychiatry and surgery at the Cumming School of Medicine, University of Calgary.

Most recently Dr. Tanguay helped found and is the chief medical officer of The Newly Institute, a disability and rehabilitation program dedicated to providing medical and psychological intervention for people living with complex and treatment resistant mental health disorders such as PTSD, depression, anxiety, addiction and chronic pain.

He was the medical lead for the Alberta Addiction Education Sessions and Opioid Dependency Treatment Education for Alberta Health Services (AHS) developing award winning educational programming.

He was the regional director for Alberta and North West Territories for the Canadian Society of Addiction Medicine where he sat as a board member, the former president of the Pain Society of Alberta, and continues to be the co-chair of the internationally recognized Alberta Pain Strategy.

He is the founder of innovative programs including the Opioid Deprescribing Program with AHS, the Rapid Access Addiction Medicine Community Clinic with AHS, and the Transitional Outpatient Pain Program for Spine clinic working with University of Calgary spinal surgeons to optimize spinal surgery outcomes. He previously consulted with the Operational Stress Injury Clinic treating veterans and RCMP for trauma related injuries.

Academically, he is involved in research in trauma, addiction, chronic pain, opioids, psychedelics and cannabis and is a member of the Hotchkiss Brain Institute and the Mathison Centre for Mental Health Research & Education at the University of Calgary.

News

• Experts appointed to emergency review panel (February 17, 2023)
• Improving Alberta’s response to public health emergencies (January 19, 2023)