In his presentation to the legislative committee reviewing the recommendations of the Five-Year Review Committee report, Investment Dealers Association president & CEO, Joe Oliver, reiterated his call for greater enforcement powers.

Oliver said that although the IDA successfully completed 165 proseuctions in the past three and a half years, it needs to do more. “Unfortunately, Canadian SROs don’t have the meaningful and effective enforcement powers that the committee has declared a necessity in today’s capital markets,” he told the committee.

He repeated calls that he has made in other speeches and regulatory submissions, seeking: the power to compel clients and financial institutions to testify and produce documents at investigations and disciplinary hearings; and, the power to enforce the penalties imposed by its discipline committees as if they were court orders.

“Without this power our disciplinary process loses credibility when it imposes well publicized and substantial monetary penalties – but has no effective means to enforce the penalties,” Oliver said. “We do what we can with the powers we have — we will not register individuals to work at member firms if they have not paid their fines — but that does not overcome justifiable skepticism about the process.”

Oliver also said that the IDA believes there is inadequate enforcement of criminal laws that deal with corporate and securities fraud. “We simply cannot allow Canada to acquire a reputation as a haven for white-collar crime,” he noted.

Finally, Oliver also maintained the IDA’s position of not explicitly supporting a single regulator, passport proposal or increasing harmonization of the current system, saying, “The IDA is not committed to a particular model. We do strongly believe there is an urgent need for decisive action and substantive improvement, or our capital markets will suffer, to the detriment of all Canadians.”

“A possible provincial compromise may be for Ontario to agree to a passport, provided other provinces commit to a national model within a fairly short time period,” Oliver proposed. “But don’t hold your breath, unless the federal government makes clear its continuing commitment to significant progress on the file.”