Campaign win: Federal government announces public beneficial ownership registry
After years of campaigning, the #endsnowwashing Coalition (Transparency International Canada, Publish What You Pay Canada, and Canadians For Tax Fairness) celebrated the announcement of a public beneficial ownership registry by the federal government. In the 2021 budget, the government committed CAD 2.1 million over two years to Innovation Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) to implement a publicly accessible registry by 2025.
TI Canada, alongside the other Coalition partners, has been advocating for a public beneficial ownership registry since 2017. Learn more at endsnowwashing.ca.
2021-2023 Strategic Plan
TI Canada released a new Strategic Plan for the 2021-2023 period. To tackle corruption and increase transparency and accountability, TI Canada will undertake objectives under four strategic priorities:
Drive Systemic Change
Grow Our Influence
Expand Our Reach and Educate and Mobilize Canadians
Enhance Our Capacity
Accountable Mining
Transparency International Canada (TI Canada) wrapped up the Accountable Mining Program at the end of March. The organization had been implementing the Accountable Mining Program since 2016. Phase II started in 2018 and resulted in six reports. The Accountable Mining National Report and Jurisdictional Reports (British Columbia, Ontario and the Yukon Territory's Reports) uncovered transparency and accountability risks in each jurisdiction's environmental assessment (EA) process. The Integrating Gender in Environmental Assessments Report highlighted the importance of considering gender when conducting EAs for a more transparent and accountable process. Finally, the recently released Transparency and Accountability Concerns for Virtual Consultation Report discussed the challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in consultations.
While implementing this program, TI Canada engaged with a variety of actors – government officials, company representatives, consultants and Indigenous communities' members. We are extremely grateful for all perspectives shared.
Recent events
Catch up on recent webinars you may have missed.
Strategic Plan Presentation (watch here)
Public Infrastructure Finance - Expectations for Ethical Behaviour (watch here)
La lutte contre la corruption au Canada - Un Bilan qui stagne ou le début d'une ère nouvelle? (écoutez ici)
Integrating Gender in Environmental Assessments (watch here)
Protecting Procurement Systems From Abuse - Government and Private Sector Approaches (watch here)
Integrity and Anti-Corruption For SMEs - Getting it Right (watch here)
Recommended content
Financial Crime Matters' Interview with TI Canada's Executive Director, James Cohen (Financial Crime Matters)
Holding Power to Account - A global strategy against corruption 2021-2030 (Transparency International)
Investors and government can't sacrifice governance in the post-COVID era (iPolitics)
Real Estate brokerages run afoul of money laundering rules (Globe and Mail)
Who benefits? A series on beneficial ownership and integrity screening in the mining sector (TI Australia)
Cullen commission money laundering report due in May gets extension to December (CBC News)