TL;DR
Canada launched “AI for All,” a $2.3 billion national AI strategy organized around six pillars including sovereign infrastructure, job creation and AI literacy. Prime Minister Carney framed the announcement alongside a phone call with Pope Leo XIV about responsible AI, but critics point out that the strategy lacks concrete safety timelines.
Days after a phone call with Pope Leo XIV about the moral risks of artificial intelligence, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney was in Toronto on Thursday and announced precisely the kind of national framework the pontiff had demanded. The strategy, called “AI for all”, commits more than 2.3 billion dollars in spending for five years. It is Canada’s most ambitious attempt yet to position itself as a serious player in the global AI race.
But the document has a notable gap. For all the talk about protecting Canadians, it offers few concrete safeguards, no strict deadlines for new regulation, and no clear enforcement architecture. the dad He warned governments that AI “demands” to be disarmed.
Carney’s strategy is more like an invitation to invest.
The six pillars
The plan is organized around six pillars, first outlined in April’s Spring Economic Update: Protect Canadians and Safeguard Democracy, Empower Canadians, Drive Shared Prosperity, Build a Sovereign AI Foundation, Scale Canadian Champions, and Create Trusted Partnerships and Global Alliances.
Minister of Artificial Intelligence Evan SolomonCanada’s first cabinet minister with that title, said the strategy reflects what citizens want. “Canadians want safe, trustworthy and sovereign AI“Solomon said in a statement.”They want the best tools to build a prosperous future guided by our values.“
Employment figures grab the headlines. Ottawa aims to create up to 90,000 AI-related jobs and career opportunities for young Canadians by 2031, in addition to another 250,000 positions created through the adoption of AI across the economy. The strategy also aims to drive the adoption of enterprise AI from its current rate of about 12 percent to 60 percent by 2034.
Sovereignty over security
The strongest language in the document is reserved for sovereignty, not security. Currently, Canada relies heavily on foreign cloud infrastructure and the strategy frames this as a vulnerability. It proposes a “build-partner-buy” approach: develop key capabilities domestically where possible, partner with trusted allies, buy into the market when appropriate.
Concrete measures include plans for a “world-leading” supercomputer and the expansion of 100-megawatt-capacity sovereign data centers to serve Canadian customers. Up to billion dollars It will be used only for public supercomputing infrastructure.
The push for sovereignty is based on an alliance that the Carney government has already begun to build. In February, Solomon and his German counterpart signed a joint AI statement at the Munich Security Conference. launching a Sovereign Technology Alliance designed to reduce dependence on concentrated technology providers.
The strategy says Canada will further expand that alliance. The parallel with Europe’s own push for technological sovereignty It’s hard to miss.
The papal factor
Carney and Pope Leo spoke by phone on May 29, days after the pontiff’s release Magnificent humanityhis first encyclical. The document, signed on the 135th anniversary of new thingscalls AI the industrial revolution of this generation and argues that without enforceable limits it will deepen inequality, erode human agency and concentrate power among a handful of companies.
According to both the Vatican and the Prime Minister’s Office, the two leaders discussed the imperative that AI must serve humanity, starting with the protection of the individual. Carney reportedly expressed Canada’s desire to lead internationally in the responsible development of AI.
The timing was deliberate. The Vatican had He recruited Anthropic co-founder Christopher Olah. to speak alongside cardinals at the launch of the encyclical, indicating that the Church views AI governance as a conversation that requires technologists at the table. Carney’s subsequent strategy announcement positions Canada as the first G7 nation to respond directly to the Pope’s call.
Where security details are not
The strategy promises new consumer privacy legislation that will enshrine the right to privacy and safeguard children’s information online. It is also committed to modernizing security laws. But it doesn’t provide any timeline for either.
Earlier this year, Canadian Minister of Identity and Culture Marc Miller said the government was considering banning AI chatbots for children under 16. That restriction does not appear in the strategy. Officials say it is under review and could be integrated into separate online harms legislation expected later this year.
The omission is notable given the global context. He The EU is building its own sovereign AI infrastructure and at the same time enforce the AI Law, the most comprehensive regulatory framework in the world. Canada’s previous attempt to legislate AI, the Data and Artificial Intelligence Act within Bill C-27, is widely considered inadequate and has not been revived.
Literacy and training
When it comes to the workforce, the strategy introduces a national AI literacy initiative that offers free initial training to all Canadians. Ottawa plans to reach one million post-secondary students and train more than 3,000 educators with AI learning kits.
An additional $30 million will go to CanCode, a federal program that funds nonprofit organizations that provide digital skills training to youth. The strategy also promises to expand the Global Talent Stream permit program to accelerate the entry of highly skilled AI workers, although specific visa targets are not revealed.
He The question of what jobs AI will createrather than destroying, it remains the subject of controversy. The strategy’s 250,000 jobs figure lacks a detailed methodology and has not yet been validated by independent economists.
What comes next?
The pressure between parties is already increasing. A cross-party group of MPs have called on the government to block the development of super-intelligent AI entirely, arguing that safety barriers should precede industrial policy. That position finds an unlikely ally in the Vatican, where Pope Leo called for AI to be “disarmed” and rejected just war theory as “obsolete” in the context of autonomous weapons.
Carney has staked his government’s credibility on the assertion that sovereignty and security can advance together. The $2.3 billion bet suggests Ottawa is serious about the first half of that equation. Whether the security architecture arrives before the supercomputer will determine whether the strategy gets the moral weight the Pope asked for or simply the computing power investors wanted.
