The Treasury Board announced Wednesday that ministers will undertake reviews of regulations in their own portfolios and propose ways to eliminate excessive bureaucracy.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
The federal government has launched a red-tape review to reduce regulatory burdens across its departments and agencies.
The Treasury Board announced on Wednesday that ministers will undertake reviews of regulations in their own portfolios and propose ways to eliminate excessive bureaucracy.
The goal is to scrap outdated and complicated rules, as well as ones that overlap with provincial regulations, that hurt the economy, the Treasury Board said in a news release.
“It’s time to make government more efficient, make its processes more effective, and to catalyze more private capital so we can build the strongest economy in the G7,” Prime Minister Mark Carney said in a statement.
The review, which was promised in the Liberals’ campaign platform, will be overseen by the newly created Red Tape Reduction Office. The office was proposed in the 2024 fall economic statement, when Justin Trudeau was still prime minister.
Ministers are expected to report back with their findings within 60 days.
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Mr. Carney vowed during the federal election campaign to run a leaner federal government by reducing its operational costs and getting it out of the way of business investment.
The Globe and Mail reported on Monday that Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne sent letters to federal cabinet ministers asking them to find spending cuts in their portfolios.
Ministers have been given the task of finding ways to reduce program spending by 7.5 per cent in the fiscal year that begins April 1, 2026, followed by 10 per cent in savings the next year and 15 per cent in the 2028-29 fiscal year. (Federal program spending refers to the cost of services provided directly by Ottawa, but excludes other major categories of spending, such as transfers to provinces, territories and individuals, as well as debt payments).
The federal government’s Bill C-5, which passed last month, also aims to reduce regulatory burdens by expediting project reviews and removing federal regulations that limit internal trade.
The red-tape review being undertaken by the Treasury Board overlaps with the federal government’s effort to reduce internal trade barriers, given that it will aim to eliminate any rules that duplicate provincial ones.
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Businesses have long lamented that regulatory hurdles, including the layering of red tape across levels of government, stifle their ability to invest and grow their operations.
“Today’s announcement of a review of federal regulations, coupled with the recent announcement to curtail inefficient government spending, are welcomed first steps by the government and something the Canadian Chamber has long advocated for,” said Matt Holmes, chief of public policy at the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, in a statement.
Statistics Canada reported earlier this year that the number of federal regulations imposed on businesses increased dramatically over the span of 15 years, a trend that weighed on investment and economic growth.
The study published in February finds regulatory requirements rose by 37 per cent between 2006 and 2021.
The increase is estimated to have lowered gross-domestic-product growth by 1.7 percentage points and employment growth by 1.3 percentage points in the business sector over that time frame.
Labour productivity, which is defined as output per hour worked, was also reduced by 0.4 percentage points.
The negative effect of regulatory accumulation on growth, employment and productivity was not as great for small businesses as it was for large ones.