Charities

A friendly visit from the CRA? About the new Charities Education Program

December 18th, 2017 by Elliot Fonarev

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) has launched a program to conduct in‑person visits to 500 registered charities each year to provide information and advice on their obligations under the Income Tax Act. The Charities Education Program (CEP) is designed to help charities avoid common errors and identify potential issues before it files its next information return.

Your charity may be selected by the CRA if it is newly registered, based on information from the charity’s information return (Form T3010, Registered Charity Information Return), or if the charity has not complied in common areas such as receipting and reporting. All charities are eligible for a CEP visit. The CRA is also considering creating an ‘on‑demand’ service in the future for charities that wish to request a CEP visit, however currently charities are not able to request a visit.

Continue reading “A friendly visit from the CRA? About the new Charities Education Program”

Non-Profits: What you need to know about Bill 154

December 13th, 2017 by Elliot Fonarev

On November 14, Bill 154 received Royal Assent in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.

Among other things, Bill 154 affects legislation governing Ontario non‑profits and charities, namely, the Corporations Act (OCA), Not‑for‑Profit Corporations Act, 2010 (ONCA) and the Charities Accounting Act (CAA). Continue reading “Non-Profits: What you need to know about Bill 154”

Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL): Federal government suspends the Private Right of Action provisions

June 13th, 2017 by Ted Hyland

Organizations – businesses, non‑profits and charities – are breathing a sigh of relief following the federal government’s decision to suspend indefinitely the coming into force of the provisions of Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL) that give persons the right to seek monetary compensation from anyone who has breached the consent rules in CASL and the collection and use of personal information rules in PIPEDA.[1]

Colloquially known as the “private right of action” clauses of CASL, they were slated to come into force on July 1, 2017; the suspension of their coming into force was accomplished by a federal Order‑in‑Council (PC Number: 2017‑0580), which was issued on June 2, 2017.

Among the groups that had lobbied the federal government to put the brakes on the implementation of the private right of action provisions were Imagine Canada and the Ontario Nonprofit Network (ONN). Imagine Canada and ONN sent a letter together to the federal Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, Navdeep Bains. The letter, dated February 14, 2017, lays out a number of the principal concerns that the nonprofit and charitable sectors have with CASL generally and with the private right of action specifically.

[1] Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (S.C. 2000, c. 5)

CRA Consultation Panel Releases its Report on Charities Political Activities

May 10th, 2017 by Claudia Pedrero

The Consultation Panel on the Political Activities of Charities (the Consultation Panel) has now released its Report recommending changes to how charities should be regulated in Canada.

Earlier this year, we blogged about the Canada Revenue Agency’s (the CRA’s) consultation process on charities’ political activities.

Our firm also submitted its recommendations to the CRA advocating for changes that would allow charities to effectively participate in public policy debates.

In our submissions we took the position that the CRA’s current rules restricting charities’ political activities make their political role ineffective despite the fact charities are uniquely positioned to advocate for the public interest and many are experts in their fields.

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Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation: July 1, 2017 on the horizon — are you ready?

April 10th, 2017 by Ted Hyland

Updated May 11, 2017: Corrections/clarifications to the 4th and 7th bullet points below.

If you were keeping close tabs three years ago on the advent of Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL), you may be forgiven if you lost sight of it in the past three years. After all, you worked hard to ensure that your organization would be able to send commercial electronic messages (CEMs) once July 1, 2014 rolled around.

Well, it’s time to pay attention again, because July 1, 2017 marks the coming into force of a couple of important features to CASL. Continue reading “Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation: July 1, 2017 on the horizon — are you ready?”

Federal Non Profit Corporations: Deadline of July 31, 2017 to transition from Canada Corporations Act to Canada Not-for-Profit Corporations Act

March 21st, 2017 by Ted Hyland

If you’re involved in a non‑profit organization that was incorporated under the Canada Corporations Act and your organization has not completed the transition to the Canada Not‑for‑profit Corporations Act, then you have until July 31, 2017 to do so. Corporations Canada has issued a notice that if the transition is not completed by July 31st, the corporation will be dissolved. In other words, the corporation will cease to exist, legally, and if it’s a registered charity, it could lose its charitable registration.

To obtain more details about what’s involved in completing the transition, you can check out the “Transition Guide” on Corporations Canada’s website.

If you have any questions about the transition process, you can also contact one of our lawyers.