A shredding ban at Alberta's Ministry of Environment and Parks is still in effect 14 months after Premier Rachel Notley issued the order amid concern about the improper destruction of documents.

Shredded documents appearing in the halls of the legislature during the transition of government from the Progressive Conservatives to the NDP prompted Notley to announce the ban on May 13, 2015.

The ban was lifted two months later for most departments but continues in the environment ministry to this day.

Government officials say the ban will stay in place until recommendations made jointly in January by the public interest and privacy commissioners are fully implemented.

"Given the commissioners' investigation was centered on Environment and Parks, we decided to maintain the shredding ban in that department until an action plan was in place to address the commissioners' recommendations," Kyle Ferguson, press secretary for Environment Minister Shannon Phillips, said in an email.

"The action plan includes retraining approximately 2,900 staff in the latest document management practices, strengthening oversight, and bringing internal processes in line with other government departments," the email added. "Much of this work has already been completed and we anticipate lifting the ban in the near future."

No wrongdoing

The investigation was launched after an anonymous whistleblower laid a complaint about documents being improperly shredded in what was then called the department of Environment and Sustainable Resource Development (ERSD).

Pictures surfaced publicly around the same time of bags full of shredded paper sitting in the halls of the Alberta legislature.,

Alberta Party leader Greg Clark also filed a formal complaint.

The subsequent investigation by Privacy Commissioner Jill Clayton and Public Interest Commissioner Peter Hourihan determined 344 boxes of documents were destroyed in ERSD the day after the May 5 provincial election.

However, the commissioners found no wrongdoing on the part of ministry staff, just "confusion" about the rules.

Bags of shredded documents were photographed in a hallway at the Alberta legislature in May 2015. (Edmonton Journal)

The commissioners made 16 recommendations, which included closing gaps in policies and developing sanctions for those who break the rules. The government has said it intends to implement all the recommendations.

The fact nearly 3,000 people are being trained on documents management suggests the problem was extensive within the department, Clark told CBC News on Thursday.

"It makes me wonder what the heck was going on there before," Clark said, noting the department had a records management policy at the time the government changed hands.

"But it was either not enforced or the policy itself was not strong enough," he said. "It makes you wonder where else this is going on and perhaps things were even worse than we thought."

Clark said he is glad training is underway so civil servants will know they can push back against political staff who may ask them to improperly destroy documents.

"I think the legacy that the PCs left is that they did not have those rules in place and that they were not clearly enforced," he said. "So on the positive side we may be in a place where we can actually get to that point by the next transition of government."

No penalties for breaking the rules

Results of the probe, released in January, found documents were destroyed without any record of why or in what order it was done, nor was there any supervision of the process.

Due to a lack of security and controls, documents may have been destroyed because staff thought they were duplicates, the commissioners concluded.

The investigation found the records management program used by the provincial government lacked accountability, with no oversight and no sanctions for anyone who broke the rules.

The investigation also revealed officials with Service Alberta weren't clear on how to process freedom of information requests for executive records in the Action Request Tracking System (ARTS), which tracks ministerial correspondence.