In my posting on an information session held recently for members of the Canadian investment industry, it was stated during the session that after the IGA was signed it had to go to Cabinet for approval. No mention was made of Parliament. I found this to be different from my understanding of the process..
After reading Blaze’s  exchange with Maura Drew-Lytle of the CBA, I contacted Maura about this matter and related what was said at another financial industry presentation. She responded fairly quickly that I would have to contact Finance.
So, I then emailed Kevin Shoom. His response was “if an agreement is reached, it would be made public and require Parliamentary approval for implementation”.
So that should settle the question of Parliamentary approval. I did notice that he used the word ‘if”. I’m not sure if that has any significance.
OOH, “If.” That may sound encouraging. Let’s cross our fingers, eh?
Methinks Flaherty and the Finance officials have more respect for Canadian sovereignty in their pinkies than the entire NDP party brass and Mulcair have in their whole bodies. See my post today …
In exchange for advice from The Obama MachineTM, the NDP agrees to bend to the will of the U.S. Ought to be a headline somewhere. Except you just did. Thank you Shubert.
It is good to hear from Shoom on the IGA. I still think the talks should be public so Canadians can see what is going on and who was swayed. This is too important for these talks to be going on behind closed doors.
I also believe that if an agreement were to be reached there would be quite possibly one or even more rounds of additional public consultation including of any draft implementation legislation.
I will also note there is nothing FATCA related on the Department of Finance’s 2012-2014 Forward Regulatory Plan.
http://www.fin.gc.ca/legislation/frp-ppr/index-eng.asp
If eventually approved by Parliament, the the torch ( or hot potato) would then pass to CRA to provide guidance to FIs in the form of a technical bulletin or something similar. That guidance would likely be subject to consultations with industry and, hopefully, some public input, before being issued in in a final form.
How long will this take?
Depends on when Parliament approves. Once Parliament approves if they were to do so the next logical step is legal action against the Government of Canada. I don’t think there is much possibility of a vote this year. Sometime in 2014 or 2015?