The Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC)
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC)
Telemarketing Rules
AFP Position Paper
The new Do Not Call List regime and how it applies to charities:
· The Telecommunications Act (the Act) includes provisions governing telemarketing activities by telemarketers.
· In 2007, the Act was amended to add a new Do-Not-Call List (DNCL) regime to the telemarketing section of the Act.
· The DNCL sets up two broad regimes:
1. a national public list to be operated by a new national DNCL Operator commencing September 2008 from which registered charities are exempt, and
2. individual private lists to be maintained by all organizations carrying out telemarketing activities, including registered charities.
The CRTC’s decision and our Petition to Cabinet
· In January 2008, the CRTC ruled that all organizations that carry out telemarketing activities—including registered charities and other exempt organizations—must register with the new national DNCL operator and help finance the costs of enforcing the telemarketing rules by paying fees. The CRTC’s decision did not put a cap on the fees, meaning that the CRTC could charge any amount and/or raise the fees unilaterally at any time.
· In April 2008, Imagine Canada and AFP filed a joint Petition to Cabinet (within the 90 day time period allowed for appeals).
· The Petition asked Cabinet to require the CRTC to vary or rescind its ruling and exempt registered charities from the fees. We argued that the CRTC’s ruling:
1. imposed a new regulatory burden and red tape on registered charities, even though Parliament had exempted registered charities from the national DNCL regime, which is the principal element of the telemarketing rules;
2. required registered charities to pay fees that can hardly be considered charitable expenditures, and
3. flew in the face of the long-standing history of regulatory forbearance toward charities exercised by federal, provincial and municipal governments on issues ranging from income tax, to municipal property tax, to corporate governance obligations under corporations law.
Current Status
· In an amended letter dated October 20, 2008 (the original letter was dated May 22, 2008), the CRTC stated that it could not find a third-party complaints investigator (the CRTC itself will take on that role). Therefore, the CRTC decided to suspend all references to fees to the Complaints Investigator delegate and records relating to such fees until further notice. However, the CRTC reserves the right to reintroduce the fee regime at any time.
· Cabinet has until January 2009 (one year from the date of the CRTC’s original decision/ruling) to respond to the petition submitted by AFP and Imagine Canada.
Action Requested
· Please urge your Members of Parliament and Senators to weigh in with Cabinet and support the AFP and Imagine Canada petition that would exempt registered charities from additional bureaucracy and the fee regime.
· Also, please urge your own organizations to contact Cabinet, their Members of Parliament and Senators.
· If you would like to contact Cabinet directly, please write to:
Mr. Kevin Lynch
Clerk of the Privy Council and Secretary to the Cabinet
Langevin Block
80 Wellington Street
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0N3
· Here is a sample letter:
[Address of the Member of Parliament or Senator]
Re: Petition to the Governor in Council concerning Telecom Decision Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) 2008-6, Vol. 142, No. 24.
I am writing on behalf of [name of your organization] regarding the above-referenced Petition to Cabinet regarding the impact of the above-noted CRTC decision on Canada’s charities.
[Our organization] is a registered charity and [summarize your organization’s mandate and role in the community in 2 – 3 sentences].
[Our organization] appreciates having access to this right to appeal to Cabinet, and we wish to sincerely thank Cabinet for its consideration of our serous concerns about this decision. We urge you to rescind the CRTC’s ruling insofar as it applies to charities.
We establish charities to deliver important services to Canadians. [Add an example of your organization’s work]. Our fundraising activities result in 22.2 million Canadians choosing to make donations to charities each year. The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) data base demonstrates that Canadians claim $9 billion per year in receipted donations to charities.
By refusing to exempt registered charities from its telemarketing rules and compelling these charities to confront more bureaucracy as well as unfair fees, the CRTC effectively undermines the spirit of Parliament’s decision to exempt registered charities from the national Do-Not-Call List (DNCL) and places an onerous burden on charities and their staffs.
In essence, registered charities must re-register with the new DNCL operator, a completely redundant act since these charities, as indicated by their descriptive name, already are registered with the Canada Revenue agency. It is not clear as to why it is necessary for charities to register with two regulatory bodies.
Apart from red tape, Canada’s charities should not be subjected to unnecessary fees, which serve as a de facto tax on charities. Under the Income Tax Act, charities are exempt from taxation. Further, they must apply their funding and resources to charitable objectives. We and, more importantly, our donors, do not consider registering with and financing a new enforcement body at the CRTC to be a charitable objective. Further, unlike commercial organizations, charities are not able to pass such fees on to customers.
We understand that it is an exceptional request to ask Cabinet to intervene in a decision of a regulatory body. However, there is a long history of federal, provincial and municipal “forbearance” and exemption of charities from fees and regulations that are burdensome and undermine our charitable missions. Charities are exempt from income tax under the Income Tax of Canada; charities that own real estate, such as churches, are overwhelmingly exempt from property tax; charities are exempt from many corporate governance duties and benefit from distinct corporations law regimes; and in the telemarketing arena, charities secured an express statutory exemption to the national DNCL, to avoid placing new constraints on the ability of charities to raise charitable donations and fund our work in our communities.
For these reasons, we urge you to rescind the CRTC ruling insofar as it applies to charities. Thank you for your consideration of our strongly-felt concerns and your support of Canada’s charities.
Yours very truly,