OTTAWA \u2014 Ottawa\u2019s chief data officer says he thinks the introduction of artificial intelligence to federal government operations will lead to \u201csome\u201d job cuts in the public service.<\/p>\n
In a recent interview with The Canadian Press, Stephen Burt said he thinks the impacts are going to vary widely and will be job-specific, with different outcomes in different areas.<\/p>\n
While he wouldn\u2019t identify the risk of job losses in specific areas of government, Burt said the goal will be to ensure employees receive opportunities to retrain and change jobs.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think there will be some, but I couldn\u2019t tell you specifically right now what the magnitude of that is going to be or where it\u2019s going to be felt most acutely,\u201d Burt said when asked about job losses.<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Mark Carney campaigned in the spring federal election on using AI to make the public service more efficient. Finance Minister Fran\u00e7ois-Philippe Champagne has asked his colleagues to identify cuts to program spending of 15 per cent over the next three years.<\/p>\n
In August, the federal government signed an agreement with Canadian artificial intelligence company Cohere to identify places where AI could enhance public service operations.<\/p>\n
The government says it plans to launch a public registry to keep Canadians in the loop on its growing use of artificial intelligence, and to help it keep track of AI projects already underway. There is no timeline yet for the registry\u2019s launch.<\/p>\n
Different departments and agencies have been using AI for years for tasks like analyzing satellite imagery and weather forecasting, predicting the outcome of tax cases and sorting temporary visa applications.<\/p>\n
Burt said AI is one of many tools the government is using to boost its efficiency.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are going to be many things being done to help enhance efficiency and focus across government and AI is just going to be one piece of it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Public Service Alliance of Canada national president Sharon DeSousa said in an email statement that AI \u201cisn\u2019t a shortcut to better public services.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cCanadians need real help from real people \u2014 not chatbots, automated phone trees or AI dead ends,\u201d DeSousa said.<\/p>\n
DeSousa said AI won\u2019t solve the core problems in departments and that cuts to the public service mean fewer services for people who need them.<\/p>\n
\u201cPM Carney must consult with unions and front line public service workers before rolling out AI across government,\u201d DeSousa said. <\/p>\n
Catherine Connelly is a professor and business research chair in the department of human resources and management at McMaster University. She said that when Canadians hear about AI in the public service, many fear a repeat of previous government debacles involving information technology, such as the Phoenix public service pay system and the ArriveCan app.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s great that they are trying to be innovative and that they\u2019re focusing on cost and that they\u2019re focusing on performance and productivity,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s just that we\u2019ve seen this before and I think it\u2019s natural for Canadians to have some concerns about how this will be rolled out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Connelly said AI is not a good substitute for human decision-making and shouldn\u2019t be deployed in any area where there\u2019s a risk of liability, or in hiring decisions.<\/p>\n
The federal government has said that in cases where AI use \u201ccan have significant impacts,\u201d such as administrative decisions, its directive on automated decision-making requires an algorithmic impact assessment. Those assessments are then published in a public register.<\/p>\n
Burt said the best thing the government can do to help employees get through any AI transition is to be clear in its communications.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we need to be open with our employees where we do see those possibilities, and there\u2019s lots of supports in place, through the various processes governments had established for a long time on how you manage workforce changes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Burt added that the government spends \u201ca fair amount of time\u201d speaking to union bargaining agents about AI.<\/p>\n
But Sean O\u2019Reilly, president of the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada, said the government isn\u2019t keeping the union adequately informed about AI adoption.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of informing the bargaining agents about AI when it does happen and it\u2019s usually after the fact, before we\u2019ve had any chance to consult,\u201d O\u2019Reilly said, adding that the union has reached out to offer Ottawa advice and guidance on AI use several times.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s never been real meaningful consultation.\u201d<\/p>\n
O\u2019Reilly said that while he welcomes the use of AI in government, he worries it will be introduced in a way that eliminates human judgment and jobs.<\/p>\n
\u201cI look at the work that public servants do in general, yes, I think there\u2019s probably some mundane tasks that we could assign to artificial intelligence,\u201d he said. \u201cIt would give the public servant the ability to get those off their plate.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014 With files from Anja Karadeglija<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2025. <\/p>\n
Catherine Morrison, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OTTAWA \u2014 Ottawa\u2019s chief data officer says he thinks the introduction of artificial intelligence to federal government operations…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":142900,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[62,276,277,45,49,48,47,714,66,61],"class_list":{"0":"post-142899","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-business","12":"tag-ca","13":"tag-canada","14":"tag-national","15":"tag-politics","16":"tag-science","17":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=142899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/142900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=142899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=142899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=142899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}