Launching the Council of the Federation
Dear Premier Charest, I would like to congratulate you and your fellow provincial and territorial leaders for taking a bold step forward and injecting new energy into the cooperative management of the Canadian federation. As you know, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives has fought tirelessly over the years to build a better Canada, from the trenches of the Meech Lake and Charlottetown accords to the referendum battlefields of Québec and the subsequent birth of the Calgary Declaration. Last week’s agreement in principle to create a new Council of the Federation shows just how much of a difference Québec can make when it has a leader who understands that the best way to serve the interests of Quebeckers is to work diligently for progress within the Canadian federation. I realize that at this stage, much flesh remains to be added to the bare bones of the Council that were agreed […]
Competing for Growth: Doing What is Right for Canada in the Reform of Securities Regulation
INTRODUCTION The Canadian Council of Chief Executives is composed of the heads of about 150 leading enterprises that operate across the country in every major sector of the economy. Its member chief executives are committed to building a stronger Canada, with an overarching goal, as expressed during the Canada Global Leadership Initiative it launched in 1999, of making Canada "the best place in the world in which to live, to work, to invest and to grow". One essential element in strengthening Canada’s economy is to remove as many barriers as possible within the country’s internal market. The Council has consistently supported such efforts for more than two decades, and in this context, the need for significant reform of securities regulation has become compelling and urgent. The Council is therefore pleased that provincial ministers responsible for securities regulation have agreed to work together to identify improvements that will inspire investor confidence […]
Perspectives, Spring 2003: Excerpts from recent speeches by members of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives
Perspectives, Spring 2003: Excerpts from recent speeches by members of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives
Last Chance: The Urgent Need for Reform of Securities Regulation in Canada
INTRODUCTION Capital markets play a vital role in economic growth. They help individuals build wealth through access to investment opportunities. They help enterprises to invest and to grow through access to capital at a competitive price. Canada’s capital markets have suffered for many years from excessive fragmentation that undermines both their efficiency and their dynamism. Previous efforts at reform have foundered for a variety of reasons, but today, the need for significant reform has become too compelling for any government or market participant to ignore. The forces of continental and global integration require further efforts to unify Canada’s economic space on many fronts. International developments in corporate governance, notably the major reforms flowing from the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in the United States, demand coherent Canadian leadership in securities regulation in particular. While the Canadian approach must be appropriate for the small-cap issuers that predominate in Canadian markets, the need to respond […]
North American Business Leaders Declare NAFTA and its Investment Provisions an Outstanding Success
Chief executive members of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, The Business Roundtable, and the Consejo Mexicano de Hombres de Negocios (the Mexican Business Council) today released a joint statement entitled Clearing the Smoke: The Success of NAFTA’s Investment Chapter. “The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), including its investment provisions under Chapter 11, is clearly an outstanding success for all three countries,” said Thomas d’Aquino, President and Chief Executive of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives. “The NAFTA has produced positive results for workers and consumers and has helped strengthen the political, business and social fabric in all three countries.” “The positive effects of NAFTA have been under-appreciated and the handful of concerns that have been raised with respect to investment provisions reflect inaccurate publicity and are unjustified,” according to John Castellani, President of The Business Roundtable. “By decreasing the risk to investors, NAFTA Chapter 11 has accelerated investment […]
G8 Must Exert Leadership on Trade
The world is approaching one of those crossroads when governments have to make decisions that will affect people’s lives for generations. Governments can take the road to greater liberalization of international trade for the good of all, or risk sliding back into a world governed by narrow and short-sighted protectionism and self-interest. Where business stands is clear. The chairmen of six leading business organizations*, all of us heads of major companies, have addressed an open letter to the heads of state and government attending the G8 Summit at Evian on Lake Geneva. We have appealed for them to show leadership in securing a successful outcome for the Doha Round trade negotiations in the World Trade Organization (WTO). As the most trade-dependent industrialized country in the world, Canada has much to gain or to lose from what happens in the WTO. Earlier this month, therefore, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives […]
Canadian Council of Chief Executives and Five International Business Organizations Urge G-8 Leaders to Bolster WTO Negotiations
In an unprecedented joint letter, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, along with five other leading international business groups, call on Prime Minister Jean ChrǸtien and the other Group of Eight (G-8) leaders for a strong commitment to the success of the World Trade Organization (WTO) Doha Round negotiations. With the global economy at a critical crossroads, G-8 leaders will meet in Evian, France on June 1st. “The G-8 leaders have an important opportunity to bolster WTO negotiations on the Doha Development Agenda. The Council and the five international business groups have issued this letter to reassert their strong support for the WTO and to push for an ambitious result this September in Cancǧn, Mexico,” said Thomas d’Aquino, President and Chief Executive of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives. “A positive result will have a far-reaching impact not just on the global economy, but on social progress, global security and […]
To Inspire or to Require: Achieving Better Governance and Corporate Responsibility
Headlines about Enron and WorldCom may be shuffling steadily toward the back pages of the papers as the various bankruptcy and legal proceedings wend their way forward. But the atmosphere of suspicion and mistrust that these scandals unleashed is still very much with us. In my mind, three questions have yet to be fully resolved. What should investors do? What should governments do? And what should companies, their directors and CEOs do? Dale Richmond has talked about what one big investor is doing, and I want to come back to some of the issues he has raised. But first I want to say a few words about what I see as the priorities at this point for governments and regulators, and then bring you up to date on what CEOs are doing, with respect both to corporate governance and to the highly related issue of corporate responsibility. The regulatory question […]
Canada Should Drive Ambitious Agenda at World Trade Talks, Business Leaders Say
Total elimination of all tariffs worldwide on industrial goods is the lead item in an ambitious Canadian agenda proposed today by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives (CCCE) for the Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations now underway in the World Trade Organization (WTO). “Canada also should examine its own remaining tariff barriers and consider the costs and benefits of setting an example for the world through unilateral action or through action by a coalition of willing members of the WTO,” the Council adds in a major paper entitled “Prosperity, Freedom and Security: Renewing Canada’s Commitment to Multilateral Trade Liberalization”. WTO Ministers will be meeting in Cancun, Mexico in September, and this meeting is likely to be decisive in determining the real level of ambition and scope of what is to be negotiated in the round of talks launched in Doha, Qatar in November, 2001. The negotiating process is under […]
Coaxing the Elephant: Can Canada Best Support Multilateralism by Cozying up to the United States?
In the early 1850s, Governor General Lord Elgin went to Washington to drum up interest in a novel idea: free trade between Canada and the United States. The result was the Reciprocity Treaty of 1854, intended to strengthen Canada’s economy by bolstering north-south trade flows as a counterbalance to what was then an excessive dependence on trade with Britain. Successful while it lasted, the treaty was ended by the United States in the wake of the Civil War, during which many American politicians perceived Britain as favouring the Confederates. As ties to the British Empire faded over the years, those to the United States grew more robust, and the question of how close is too close came to dominate Canadian discussions of its relationship with its southern neighbor. Since the Second World War, Canadians have teetered between two alternatives: yielding to geography by focusing on strengthening ties within North America; […]
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