The Alberta government had hit pause on its order for the removal of books with explicit sexual content from libraries, but the premier says that pause will be short lived.
Speaking at an unrelated news conference on Tuesday, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said new rules are on the way.
“It’ll be paused for a couple of hours while the ministerial order is rewritten. The direction will be to take books with pornographic images out of the libraries and to leave the classics alone. I think that there was some misunderstanding of the order, so it’s being made clear.”
Smith said school boards can expect a new ministerial order soon.
“We are hoping that the school boards understand what we’re trying to achieve.”
Alberta pauses controversial book ban ahead of rewrite
The policy from Alberta’s education minister outlining new rules governing books in school libraries is set to come into effect Oct. 1. Earlier Tuesday, he emailed school boards to say the ministerial order was being paused.
“Until further notice, please pause all implementation efforts outlined in Ministerial Order (#30/2025), including removing materials containing depictions of explicit sexual content from school libraries,” reads the email sent on behalf of Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides.
“At this time, I ask that school authorities also pause the development and distribution of lists of school library materials.”
The email does not state the reason for the pause but says more information will be provided as soon as possible.
Smith was more blunt in a subsequent post on X, formerly Twitter.
“I’m going to be more explicit than usual so there is no misunderstanding this policy: 1. Get graphic pornographic images out of school libraries. 2. Leave the classics on the shelves. 3. We all know the difference between the items in 1 and 2. Let’s not play any more games in implementing this policy for our kids,” she wrote.
An internally distributed list obtained by CBC News showed more than 200 books deemed sexually explicit were slated for removal from Edmonton Public Schools library shelves for students in kindergarten to Grade 12.
The list, which included titles like The Handmaid’s Tale, Brave New World and Jaws attracted the attention of Canadian author Margaret Atwood.
Smith slammed the Edmonton school board for its list on Friday stating, “Edmonton public is clearly doing a little vicious compliance over what the direction is.”
The minister’s office declined a request for an interview from CBC News.
The minister signed a ministerial order, dated July 4, laying out the standards for school library materials and included definitions.
Alberta government suspends new rules on explicit books in schools
Nicolaides has previously said the policy was not about banning books, but putting rules in place for schools that lack standards for age-appropriate material.
Under the order, schools were also tasked with implementing clear policies by the new year on how the directive would be maintained.
The rules, as outlined in Nicolaides’s ministerial order, ban books with explicit sexual content for students in all grades. Those in Grade 10 and over would have access to books containing what the province deems to be non-explicit sexual content.
Parents for Choice in Education was one of the groups that convinced the government to enact the new book rules after flagging four graphic novels.
Executive director John Hilton-O’Brien criticized Edmonton Public Schools for the “stunt” of pulling well-known works of literature to comply with the ministerial order.
“It’s like when a kid twists an adult’s instructions, the adult doesn’t back down, they restate them more clearly,” he said. “This is about protecting children and if boards won’t do it, the government may have to get a bit more involved.”
The government pause was welcomed by Joseph Jeffrey, chair of Canadian School Libraries.
Jeffrey said the original order was too broad. He said that Edmonton Public Schools did the best they could at interpreting an order that lacked clarity.
Jeffrey said if the government still wished to restrict books, they should take time to do it using the expertise of educators with a background in selecting school resources.
“If you want to do this properly, get real teachers, real teacher-librarians to do the work to come up with this selection criteria in a way that makes sense and fits within what other jurisdictions across Canada are doing,” he said.
Jeffrey said people from across the country are reaching out to his organization to express their unhappiness over what Alberta is trying to do.
Naheed Nenshi, leader of the Opposition NDP, said Smith and Nicolaides are focusing on book lists when they should be dealing with overcrowded classrooms, a looming teacher strike, and among the lowest per-capita spending in the classroom.
He criticized Smith for continuing to blame others for following an overly-broad ministerial order.
“The easy thing to do here would have been [to say] ‘sorry, we made a mistake. This is not what we meant’,” he said. “‘We’re going to fix this and we’ll get back to you shortly’. But they couldn’t even do that.”
