Article content continued

“There is no question in our minds that the department is targeting political activities,” said Sandra Guttman, the association’s general counsel.

“Any public servant reading it would certainly be reticent to use any form of social media whatsoever at the risk of being investigated and disciplined. One might also infer from the message that the department may be monitoring computers in the workplace and online activities of its employees.”

For the first time, the government has publicly released the manual for the “caretaker convention,” which includes guidelines to govern the conduct of ministers, political staff and public servants during elections and, for the first time, flags the use of social media.

It says departments’ websites and social media channels can only be used for government business and “government resources should not be used to support personal or partisan social media accounts.”

The Thériault memo reminds public servants of the guidelines, as well as the values-and-ethics code that governs behaviour during an election. What irks the unions is a list of warnings about their “duty of loyalty” to the government when using social media in their personal lives.

The note says “you are a public servant 24/7,” warns that the information shared is public, says there is no privacy regardless of privacy settings, and notes there are ways for employees to be identified as public servants.

“You cannot control the actions of others and what they do, or how they comment, on the information you share, which may place you at risk,” says the memo. It cautions that even a disclaimer on social media accounts doesn’t “absolve you of your public servant responsibilities.”