SHA plans to create anonymous reporting

REGINA – The Saskatchewan Health Authority listed a project on SaskTenders, the provincial procurement website, earlier this month, inviting bids to create a service to anonymously report when “employees and others are suspected of violating SHA policies, codes of conduct or conflict of interest rules.”

In a statement to CBC News, the SHA said the mechanism is intended for “serious concerns such as fraud, conflict of interest or other wrongdoings.”

It said the mechanism would support the province’s whistleblower legislation – the Public Interest Disclosure Act (PIDA) – which protects public employees who disclose workplace wrongdoing of public interest in good faith.

The SHA says anonymous reporting is “a widely used best practice” across Canadian health systems and is intended to ensure staff have a safe reporting option to raise concerns without worrying about reprisals.

“Particularly when they may not feel comfortable coming forward through other channels,” the SHA said in a statement.

PIDA asks people seeking to make a disclosure of wrongdoing to first contact the provincial interest disclosure commissioner or the designated officer in their organization.

According to the government’s website, a disclosure of wrongdoing form, which requires a name, might be required.

The SHA says it originally posted the tender in January 2025 and reposted it this month after “no vendor submissions were identified that met the organization’s requirements.”

The SHA says it consulted with union partners to inform them of the work and seek input before the original posting, but one Saskatchewan healthcare union says it only recently learned about it.

“They just sent the information to us to provide our input,” said Bashir Jalloh, president of Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 5430, which is the largest healthcare union in Saskatchewan.

He said union leaders are still reviewing the information, but don’t want to see employees “on the lower end” targeted.

“We just don’t want it to be an instrument that is going to be used to create … more problems in the workplace,” Jalloh said.

He said healthcare workers are already working long hours in understaffed workplaces “and we do not want a policy that is going to create more problems for that.”

The reporting mechanism could lead to health-care workers feeling “surveilled in their workplace,” according to the Opposition NDP.

“The last thing that an overworked nurse in an emergency room – who’s being spat at, who’s working a shift that’s understaffed – needs is to be looking over her shoulder, worried that her coworker is going to report her for something,” NDP health critic Meara Conway (pictured) said.

“It’s an anonymous reporting mechanism where you can report a worker in the healthcare system for not following policies. To me, that’s a snitch line.”

Given that the SHA’s corporate communication policy requires “all team members” to ensure “that SHA’s brand and reputation are held in good standing,” and to “build and champion the SHA brand and reputation,” the reporting mechanism could have a chilling effect on whistleblowers, Conway said.

The Opposition is concerned that the “SHA policies” wording in the tender request would capture things like speaking to media or saying something that would damage the SHA’s reputation, she said.

“Arguably a lot of what we’re seeing right now with healthcare workers stepping forward go contrary to those policies,” Conway said, referencing workers from St. Paul’s Hospital in Saskatoon who recently spoke out about the violence they face in their workplace.

“Part of my concern is that arguably this could treat whistleblowing as misconduct,” Conway said.

“This is also in the larger context of retaliations, threats of retaliation and real retaliation that we’ve seen.”