The Liberals have recently released their Liberal Party Platform-Forward-For-Everyone. The Liberals and Conservatives have always played a culture war game at the expense of the charity sector. Whether it’s political activities of environmental charities, abortion, etc. The cost of…
In the Statistics Canada “Canadian Survey on Business Conditions, third quarter 2021” it has some interesting comments relating to non-profits. Stats Can notes that “This survey collects information on business expectations in the future and the ongoing impact of the…
Here is the Blumbergs’ Snapshot of the Ontario Charity Sector 2019. We recently reviewed the T3010 Registered Charity Information Return database for 2019 as part of the Sean Blumberg Transparency Project and focussed on the T3010s of Ontario registered charities. …
Here is the Blumbergs’ Canadian Charity Sector Snapshot 2019. We recently reviewed the T3010 Registered Charity Information Return database for 2019 as part of the Sean Blumberg Transparency Project. The database covers about 83,892 of the approximately 86,000 registered charities…
The Conservatives have put forward some proposals in their platform that are unclear and could have a significant negative effect on the charity sector, especially larger charities such as universities, hospitals, international development and environmental organizations. Here are the proposals…
The Conservative party has just released their platform and they have committed to increasing the disbursement quota from the current 3.5% to 7.5%. The Liberal government is currently undergoing a consultation on whether the disbursement quota should be left at…
It took many years but finally, it looks like new Ontario Not-For-Profit Corporations Act (ONCA) and the Ontario Business Registry will be launched on October 19, 2021. We will have more on this at our upcoming Blumbergs’ Charity Law Institute…
Yesterday it was announced that the 2021 Federal election will be held on September 20, 2021. Charities and non-profits need to pay attention to the rules that could apply to them including under the Income Tax Act, Third-party election advertising,…
Many Canadian registered charities have March 31 year ends. Mostly these are aligned with government funders who have a similar year-end. These March 31 registered charities need to ensure that they can accurately file their T3010 by September 30.…
In the 2021 Federal Budget, it was announced that the Department of Finance will be doing a consultation on the disbursement quota and whether it should be raised. Interesting that the title used by Finance is “Consultation: Boosting charitable spending…
Here is the Blumbergs’ Submission to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance for the Pre-Budget Consultations in Advance of the Upcoming 2022 Federal Budget. We offer 11 recommendations namely the following: List of Recommendations Primary Recommendations Recommendation…
In this excellent article by Steven Ayer, he writes that confidence in the charity sector has fallen considerably over the last two decades. The article “Confidence in charity leaders has fallen sharply over the last two decades – what does…
With respect to a recent bill passed by the Senate, but not the House of Commons, relating to structured arrangements/direction and control we have prepared the following blog posts with our concerns about the bill and its ultimate impact. …
The Standing Committee on Finance (FINA) has launched its annual Pre-Budget Consultations for the 2022 Federal budget. If you wish to make a written submission you can do so on the FINA website. All submissions need to be submitted by…
I recently took a look at the CRA Charities Listing for groups that were revoked as a result of audit and there were 14 groups listed as revoked as a result of audit: Showing 1 to 14 of 14…
A few weeks ago a Canadian registered charity called the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF) was involved in a scandal when it was discovered that its president had hired a private investigator to surveil the Chief-Justice of Manitoba who…
I recently read a fascinating report from the Edmonton Chamber of Voluntary Organizations (ECVO) on Transforming the Non-Profit Community in Edmonton. It is relevant to all cities and communities in Canada. So many great quotes but here are just a…
In our note “How has COVID affected funding of the Canadian charity sector Part 2?” we reviewed T3010 data and found amongst the 11,821 registered charities that total revenue for these charities from 2019 to 2020 is down by 5%…
Here is a note from CRA trying to spread the word about rapid testing and workplaces dealing with COVID. This also includes a program of the Canadian Red Cross for charities, non-profits or Indigenous community organizations with five (5) personnel…
In this article Canadian charities giving to Indigenous Charities and Qualified Donees – 2018, Sharon Redsky, Wanda Brascoupe, Mark Blumberg and Jessie Lang reviewed the T3010 Registered Charity Information Return database for 2018 to see how many gifts and the…
I listened to a webinar recently that I thought was very good entitled: Community Learning Series – Trust-Based Philanthropy Here is a description of the webinar: As grantmakers, we have a responsibility to confront the ways our sector has contributed…
In the last couple of weeks I have read two separate CRA notes on the importance of maintaining sufficient separation between a registered charity and a non-qualified donee (whether non-profit, foreign charity, for-profit, etc) Here is an excerpt from a…
CRA has announced new webinars dealing with registered charities and receipting. Here is a link. Here is the note from CRA: Charities and giving – What’s new Charities information webinars We are pleased to announce that the next charities…
CRA recently sent out an email entitled “Warning: Watch out for tax shelter gifting schemes“. I am not sure if this is just regular communication or there is an upswing in these. You would think that they would be warning…