Conservative MP Adam Chambers has introduced a private member’s bill that would add transparency to writeoffs rules. It is expected to proceed to committee in 2026.Justin Tang/The Canadian Press
Debt writeoffs by the federal government climbed above the $5-billion mark during the last fiscal year, according to figures reviewed by The Globe and Mail, adding to a debate over Ottawa’s practice of keeping the identities of those who benefit from such debt relief secret.
While the total amounts are disclosed each year, the government does not reveal the names of the businesses and individuals whose debts, most stemming from unpaid taxes, were written off.
The only other time in the past decade when the total was higher than $5-billion was in the fiscal year that ended in 2018. That year, writeoffs spiked to $6.3-billion. They fell steadily to $2.3-billion in 2021, but have risen every year since then.
The upward trend in writeoffs inspired Conservative MP Adam Chambers to introduce a private member’s bill, C-230, that would require Ottawa to publicly disclose all corporate writeoffs worth $1-million or more.
The bill would also force the Canada Revenue Agency to explain why the debt was forgiven.
“These trends are very concerning, and further justification for increased transparency around these writeoffs by the government,” Mr. Chambers told The Globe in a statement responding to the latest figures.
“It is reasonable for the public to know who these corporations are and why these amounts are not recoverable. Given we are in a state of perpetual deficits, the government – and by extension, taxpayers – cannot continue to turn a blind eye to these trends.”
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During the opening debate on the bill in late November, Mr. Chambers said the growing size of writeoffs each year is alarming and the public deserves to have such information.
Based on the comments from other parties during the debate, it appears the bill will have enough support to move ahead to a committee study when it is debated for another hour at some point early this year and put to a vote at second reading.
“This is a great legislative initiative,” said Liberal MP Ryan Turnbull, the parliamentary secretary to François-Philippe Champagne, the Minister of Finance and National Revenue, during the debate on the bill.
Sébastien Lemire, a Bloc Québécois MP, thanked Mr. Chambers for his leadership on the file and said the issue he raises “is grounded in one fundamental value: fairness.”
In a detailed speech on the bill, Mr. Turnbull said that while all MPs support the “high-level aims of the bill,” the government has some concerns that it hopes can be addressed through amendments at committee. For instance, he said the government believes the $1-million threshold for disclosure is too low.
The federal government’s guide to debt deletion says writeoffs are used when debts are determined to be uncollectable, when the expense of collecting the debt would not be justified or when there is a settlement for the debt. The rules say a debt that is written off is removed from a department’s accounts but could be reinstated.
The latest figures were recently published in the Public Accounts.
They show the total amount of writeoffs climbed to $5.3-billion in 2024-25, up from $4.9-billion the year before.
The total amount under a separate category called “forgiveness” fell sharply over that same period, to $1.2-billion, from $10.9-billion.
The large amount of debt forgiveness in 2023-24 was an expected outcome of a major pandemic-era program called the Canada Emergency Business Account.
CEBA provided a total of $49-billion in loans in 2020 and 2021 to nearly 900,000 businesses, most of them small or medium-sized. The loans were for either $40,000, of which $10,000 was to be forgiven, or $60,000, of which $20,000 was to be forgiven.
The loans were to be repaid by Jan. 18, 2024, in order to have amounts forgiven.
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With respect to forgiveness, the debt deletion guide says there are no set criteria in the Financial Administration Act for determining when a debt may be forgiven because Parliament must have the authority to do so under whatever circumstances it deems appropriate.
The rules say a debt that is forgiven is legally extinguished, but unlike a debt that is written off it cannot be reinstated.
The latest figures do not provide a breakdown in terms of how many companies are involved.
However, The Globe has reported on figures from the previous fiscal year that showed just 11 companies accounted for nearly a quarter of the $4.9-billion in writeoffs that were approved in 2023-24.