Nate Pike Sean Dunn

[REDACTED] [REDACTED]

Alia Kohlmann Christopher Edwards

[REDACTED] [REDACTED]

Gurjot Mand
[REDACTED]

Distribution List

9 July 2020

RE: IMPROPER EXPENDITURE OF PUBLIC MONIES BY THE

CANADIAN ENERGY CENTER TO FUND PARTISAN
ADVERTISING ON BEHALF OF THIRD-PARTIES

As concerned Albertans, we are writing to inform you of recent actions of The Canadian Energy
Centre (CEC) that have come to our attention that appear to violate several statutes and
regulations that are within your respective areas of oversight. Specifically, between April - June
of this year, the CEC expended public funds on advertisements on behalf of third-parties, for the
purpose of collecting personal information of Albertans to further partisan activities of these
third-parties. Thorough evidence is enclosed.

Under the circumstances, we believe three investigations are warranted:

a. by the Auditor General, to determine: whether this expenditure of public funds on

partisan advertising defrauded the public; if other similar expenditures exist outside of
the public view; and what controls and oversight prevent similar improper use of public
funds by the CEC in the future.

b. by the Privacy Commissioner, to determine: whether the CEC violated Division 2 of the
Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, in that, as a public body, the CEC
encouraged and facilitated Albertans in providing their personal information to
third-parties, for partisan purposes, while misleading Albertans about who was collecting
and using their personal information; and, whether the privacy policy of
“SupportCanadianEnergy.ca” as a public body operated by the CEC meets applicable
privacy regulations.

c. by the Ethics Commissioner, to determine: whether Ministers Savage, Schweitzer and

Nixon, as concurrent Directors of the CEC and Ministers of the Crown, violate Section

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 21(1)(c) of the Conflict of Interest Act in that they “[hold] an office or directorship..that
creates or appears to create a conflict between a private interest of the Minister and the
public duty of the Minister.” In holding directorships of the CEC, they have a
responsibility to ensure controls are in place to prevent public funds from being directed
to further their private political interests. That such controls appear to be non-existent or
ineffective implicate a negligence in their fiduciary duties, thus creating the appearance
of a conflict between the public interest and their private political interests.

Knowledge of the activities detailed below was only made possible via Facebook’s recent “Ad
Transparency” feature. Without the ability to submit freedom-of-information requests to the CEC,
the public is denied essential transparency about whether partisan use of public funds by the
CEC is more widespread in other mediums and channels than we were able to ascertain
through Facebook alone. This amplifies the urgency of investigations in the interest of public
trust and transparency.

We have enclosed, in detail, substantiating evidence of the incidents in question. We look

forward to hearing your response in this matter.

Very respectfully,

Nate Pike Sean Dunn, CD, P.Eng.

Alia Kohlmann Christopher Edwards, P.Eng.

Gurjot Mand

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Distribution List

Auditor General of Alberta

8th Floor, 9925 - 109 Street
Edmonton, Alberta T5K 2J8

Information and Privacy Commissioner of Alberta

#410, 9925 - 109 Street
Edmonton, Alberta

Ethics Commissioner of Albera

Suite 1250, 9925 - 109 Street NW
Edmonton, Alberta, T5K 2J8

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StrongAndProud.ca

According to Facebook Ad Transparency, the CEC paid for a Facebook Ad that ran from 15 - 17
May 2020 (enclosed) that linked directly to a third-party website, “StrongAndProud.ca”; the ad
featured a meme (produced by StrongAndProud.ca) captioned “Send Trudeau a Message”.
Facebook estimates this advertisement received 9,000-10,000 impressions. Clicking the ad link
leads directly to a page hosted on “StrongAndProud.ca” that collects personal information under
the auspices of a letter-writing campaign to “Tell your MP”.

“StrongAndProud.ca” is operated by the organization Canada Strong and Proud, which was
registered as a third-party advertiser with Elections Canada in the 2019 federal election. The
associated Facebook Page of Canada Strong and Proud, @ProudCanadiansOnline spent
$177,846 between June 2019 - July 3, 2020 on partisan advertisements primarily attacking the
Liberal Party of Canada.

Elections Canada filings show that Canada Strong and Proud received $240,500 in donations
from the Manning Center for Building Democracy (renamed in January 2020 to the “Canada
Strong and Free Network”), which declares its purpose to be to “support Canada’s conservative
movement” and which has close ties with the United Conservative Party and it’s leadership.

Canada Strong and Proud is responsible for controversial robo-call and robo-text campaigns,
widely reported in the press1 and supported by expense filings with Elections Canada. This
amplifies the concern that public funds are directing Albertans to provide their personal
information to this organization, which can then be used for campaigning.

StrongAndProud.ca does not provide a privacy policy or terms of use on the website.

StrongAndProud.ca also collects donations on the website linked to from the CEC
advertisement, although the legal person who is the beneficiary of the donations is not identified
on the website.

EnergyCitizens.ca

According to Facebook Ad Transparency, the CEC paid for a Facebook Ad that ran from 12 - 13
May 2020 captioned “Stand up for Oil and Gas -- sign the open letter to Elizabeth May” that
linked directly to the third-party website, “EnergyCitizens.ca”. This website is run by the
Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP). CAPP is a registered lobbyist in Alberta.
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1
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2019/07/25/canadian-group-linked-to-election-robocalls-registers-
as-third-party.html
2
​https://www.albertalobbyistregistry.ca/

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Like StrongAndProud.ca, the CAPP-operated EnergyCitizens.ca collects personal information,
valuable for its own lobbying activities as “grassroots communication”, as defined by Section
1(1)(e) of the Lobbyist Act of Alberta.

SupportCanadianEnergy.ca

According to Facebook Ad Transparency, the CEC paid for an ad that ran from 1 Jun - 30 June
2020 that linked to the page “SupportCanadianEnergy.ca” website with the caption “Sign up for
the Canadian Energy Newsletter”.

The website “SupportCanadianEnergy.ca” is operated by the Canadian Energy Center itself and
does contain a privacy policy, however it’s not clear whether this privacy policy meets the
requisite standard established by the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.

It is not immediately clear to a visitor of the website “SupportCanadianEnergy.ca” that the site is
operated by the CEC, as it does not share the same branding or name as the CEC website. In
look-and-feel, “SupportCanadianEnergy.ca” shares much more in common with
“StrongAndProud.ca” and “EnergyCitizens.ca” which are ​not​ operated by the CEC and thus not
public bodies. As the CEC has advertised for all three websites, the CEC obfuscates and
misleads Albertans about who is collecting their personal information, which is and isn’t a public
body, and what privacy protections may or may not apply.

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Figure 1​: The Facebook Ad run by the Canadian Energy Center that links directly to the website
“StrongAndProud.ca”

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Figure 2​: The website “StrongAndProud.ca” that the CEC ad links directly to. The page collects
personal information, donations, and does not have a privacy policy.

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Figure 3​: The @ProudCanadiansOnline Facebook page that associates itself with the
StrongAndProud.ca website, and contains the same meme and link to the StrongAndProud.ca
website as the CEC ad.

8
Figure 4​: Sample of partisan memes and ads run by @ProudCanadiansOnline (aka
StrongAndProud.ca) on their Facebook page.

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Figure 5​: Facebook Ad Transparency showing Proud To Be Canadian (aka
@ProudCanadiansOnline, StrongAndProud.ca) showing advertising expenditure to be $177,846
between June 2019 - July 5, 2020

10
Figure 6​: Elections Canada Third-Party Campaign Return showing a $240,500 donation from
the Manning Centre to Canada Strong and Proud. Accessed at
ttps://www.elections.ca/fin/oth/thi/advert/tp43/TP-0024_due21.pdf

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Figure 7​: CBC Reporting of Canada Strong and Proud being linked to robocalls and robotexts.
Accessed at
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-strong-proud-robocalls-third-party-federal-election-1.52
25301

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Figure 8​: CEC Advertisement run 12 May - 13 May 2020 that links directly to third-party
collection of personal data at “EnergyCitizens.ca”, operated by registered lobbyist Canadian
Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP).

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Figure 9​: Clicking on the CEC advertisement link directs to the “EnergyCitizens.ca” website,
which collects personal information on behalf of registered lobbyist CAPP

14
Figure 10:​ Registration of CAPP as an active lobbyist organization in Alberta.

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Figure 11​: CEC Advertisement run 1 June - 30 June 2020 that links to
“SupportCanadianEnergy.ca”

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Figure 12​: Clicking on the CEC ad directs to this Newsletter Signup page for
“SupportCanadianEnergy.ca”, operated by CEC.

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Figure 13​: The privacy policy of “SupportCanadianEnergy.ca”, which collects personal data, as
a public body operated by the CEC.

Privacy Policy
Effective as of February 7, 2020

Introduction and Scope

www.supportcanadianenergy.ca is owned and operated by the Canadian Energy Centre Ltd (“Company”,
“CEC”, “we”, “us”, and “our”). CEC is committed to protecting your privacy. The following are the
relevant disclaimers, terms and conditions for use of the CEC website and by accessing our website you
consent to the data collection and use practices described herein. Canadian Energy Centre Ltd. considers
matters relating to the protection of your personal information and your privacy to be extremely
important. In order for the Company to conduct its business and to manage our relationship with you, we
may need to collect, store, use, and disclose some of your personal information. We have developed this
privacy policy (the “Privacy Policy”) to inform you of the manner in which your personal information
will be collected, used and disclosed. This Privacy Policy applies to the Company and our website.

General

We will only collect, use and disclose your personal information as permitted by law. Usually this will
require that we obtain your consent for the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information for
a particular purpose. However, in certain limited circumstances your consent is not required (for
example, where the collection, use or disclosure of the information is reasonable for the purposes of an
investigation or legal proceeding, or where a statute or regulation authorizes or requires the collection,
use or disclosure of personal information without consent). The Company may collect, use and disclose
your personal information without your consent or knowledge in those limited circumstances where your
consent or knowledge is not required by law.

Personal Information We Collect and How We Collect It

We collect personal information primarily to communicate with you, such as your email address, if you
choose to provide it to us and if you consent to us communicating with you via email. We also gather
certain statistical information about how you access and use our website, such as your browser version,
location, IP address, and the pages you access during a session, to help us understand how people use our
website, and to identify technical or usability problems with it. We collect this information to help us
improve our website. We do not retain this statistical information in a way which identifies you
personally. We use an internet technology, called cookies, on our website. A cookie is a file that stores a
small amount of data on your device and assists in gathering the statistical information referred to above.
Our website uses anonymous cookies. You can manage or disable cookies at any time by adjusting your
browser settings.

Unless otherwise required or permitted by law or unless otherwise set out in this Privacy Policy:

(i) we will only collect your personal information directly from you, and (ii) when we collect your
personal information we will inform you of the uses and disclosures that we intend to make of your
personal information.

Use

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 We will use personal information you provide only for purposes consistent with the reason you provided
it. We will use your email address to communicate with you in ways you have consented to, and we will
use statistical data to help improve our website.

We retain your personal information for as long as is necessary to conduct our business, to manage our
relationship with you, and for other essential purposes, such as complying with our legal obligations.

Disclosure

We may engage service providers to assist us in our activities, including information technology service
providers. It may be necessary for us to disclose your personal nformation to these service providers in
some circumstances. If we provide personal information to services providers, we will require those
services providers to protect the information in the same manner as we do. These service providers may
not use your personal information for any purpose other than the reason you provided it to us.
In certain circumstances we may disclose your personal information without obtaining your further
consent, where it is permitted or required by law—for example, to comply with
legislation or at the request of investigative authorities.

Choices

You have certain choices relating to your personal information we collect and use. You may request that
we provide you with access to the personal information that we hold about you. You may ask us to
correct any errors or delete any of the information we have about you. We note, however, that your
ability to exercise these choices is not absolute. In some circumstances (for example, if the information is
protected by legal privilege or if the information was collected for an investigation or legal proceeding),
we may be permitted or obliged to deny such requests. In addition, to protect your privacy and the privacy
of others, we may have to verify that you are who you say you are before we can give you access to, or
change, information about you.

How to Contact Us

You may contact us, to ask questions or exercise choices relating to this Privacy Policy, in writing at
privacy@canadianenergycentre.ca

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