AI for All: bridging the trust, adoption, and sovereignty gaps

On June 4, 2026, the federal government released Canada’s National Artificial Intelligence Strategy: AI for All (the Strategy), synthesizing over 11,000 submissions heard during a national consultation sprint in fall 2025. Grounded in the premise that the benefits of artificial intelligence (AI) should be shared among Canadians, the Strategy sets out the federal government’s proposals for new legislation, educational initiatives, investments, and global partnerships to work towards the widespread adoption of safe, responsible, Canadian AI.

What you need to know

• The Strategy focuses on building public trust in AI, accelerating widespread adoption, and investing in Canadian innovation, talent, and infrastructure.
• The government has committed to future legislative developments in Canadian privacy and online safety to further the Strategy’s goals to protect Canadians and safeguard democracy.
• Healthcare is the Strategy’s sector of first priority to develop initiatives that accelerate the adoption of AI.

Current state

While leadership in research and innovation is evident across Canada’s university programs and research centres and frontier model companies, Canada lags behind its global allies in the widescale adoption, public trust, and sovereign capabilities of AI. To address these gaps and help Canada reach its significant potential, the Strategy sets out a six-pillar framework focused on broad themes of trust, opportunity, and sovereignty.

Trust: legislation and global networks

The Strategy identifies various risks posed by AI (such as disinformation and data misuse) and a key weakness in Canada’s AI ecosystem: a lack of public trust in these emerging technologies. To address these concerns, Canada makes a number of commitments, including to:

• update Canada’s public and private sector privacy legislation;
• introduce online safety laws; and
• invest in developing new standards and creating watermarking and certification programs to help identify trustworthy AI products in the marketplace.

It also prioritizes various measures to respond to some of AI’s security and misinformation risks, including by investing in AI-powered cyber defence and national security.

The Strategy also emphasizes strengthening partnerships with global allies. The sixth pillar aims to promote global trust in artificial intelligence, which includes attracting foreign investment, procurement opportunities, and talent, collaborating on developing transparent, interoperable, open-source AI systems, and engaging a diverse range of international partners with likeminded priorities.

Canada does not appear to propose the introduction of an AI-specific regulatory statute, as the previous government had with the Artificial Intelligence and Data Act.

Opportunity: education and adoption

To bridge the adoption gap, the Strategy’s second pillar focuses on AI literacy and employment. Proposals include large-scale investment in entry-level AI education, creating new jobs (including jobs for young Canadians), supporting Indigenous-led initiatives, and ensuring key elements of Canadian identity and culture—such as language rights and accessibility—are embedded in Canadian AI.

To leverage AI for economic growth, the Strategy’s third pillar includes investing in initiatives to reduce small and medium-sized enterprises’ barriers to accessing AI, accelerating the use of AI within the federal government, and adopting a “mission-driven” collaborative approach that aligns government, capital, talent, and industry around goals in targeted sectors.

Sovereignty: resources and investment

Finally, the Strategy recognizes that Canada is well-positioned to advance its AI ecosystem based on its strong foundations in compute, data, and talent. The fourth pillar involves investing in sovereign compute, cloud and connectivity (including constructing data centres, expanding network resiliency, and developing a public supercomputer), focusing on building out secure, standardized data platforms at scale, and investing in homegrown talent at an early stage.

While a significant portion of overall investment in Canada’s early-stage ecosystem funds technology-driven companies, Canadian founders historically flock to jurisdictions with greater capital and larger customer bases. The Strategy’s fifth pillar seeks to address this by committing Canada to:

• establishing a $500 million Canadian Tech Growth Fund to scale-up innovative early-stage companies and committing $1.75 billion to stimulate private sector investment;
• supporting SMEs’ commercialization efforts in Canada through access to a $700 million Compute Access Fund and other targeted resources; and
• championing Canadian companies’ growth in and outside of Canada.

Priority sectors: emphasizing healthcare

The Strategy identifies a list of priority sectors that will be the focus of the Strategy’s implementation, including each of the following:

1. Health and life sciences
2. Energy and natural resources
3. Transportation
4. Agriculture
5. Manufacturing and robotics

Additionally, given the government’s recent commitments to national security, it will also prioritize dual-use applications for products and systems that can be adapted for military purposes.

Throughout the Strategy, the government’s focus on healthcare is clear as a first-priority sector. The Strategy contemplates establishing a $100 million Health Sector Data Space focusing on standardizing healthcare datasets, and launching the AI Missions Program with an inaugural $200 million initial investment focused on advancing AI adoption in the healthcare sector.

Looking forward

Now that the Strategy has been released, organizations should consider how the government’s proposals and priorities impact their operations and risk horizons. For example, the Strategy indicates an appetite to introduce privacy reforms that target or apply to AI. While these reforms could resemble the formerly proposed Consumer Privacy Protection Act (for more information, read our previous publication on the proposed Bill C-27), forthcoming legislation may differ. Businesses can reduce risk by proactively implementing privacy and data protection measures commensurate with best practices. Additionally, organizations should consider how best to align AI development, deployment, and use with the Strategy’s key priorities.

This is the first article in a series about AI for All. Look out for future guidance from our team as to how AI for All may impact targeted industries, sectors, and types of businesses.