The OECD Report on Abuse of Charities for Money Laundering and Tax Evasion is well worth reading for anyone who cares about the Canadian charitable sector. On my quick read of the report it seems that Canada has probably more…
In this article, I look at and criticize a sensationalist and inaccurate article in the Ottawa Citizen entitled “Downturn will sink 10,000 non-profits: think-tank: ‘We’re just beginning to see blood in the pool,’ expert warns”. I recently read an article…
The Foundation Center’s Interactive Map of Direct Grants by U.S. Grantmakers to Non-US Recipients is helpful to see how almost $7 billion dollars worth of grants went from the US to non-US charities etc. It may be helpful to Canadian…
I was merrily reading the Business Section of the Globe and Mail on February 7, 2009, and there was an advertisement stating: “Donation Tax Shelters Still Make Financial Sense”. The advertisement does not say who it is from. There is…
Most of CRA’s view on political activities by Canadian charities can be found in Policy Statement CPS-022 Political Activities. (see Political Activities (CPS – 022) located at I highly recommend that any charity considering conducting any activity that…
Ontario charities incorporated under the Ontario Corporations Act can save time and energy by filing one new directors and officer form instead of two, beginning when the Ontario corporation has a fiscal year end in 2009. Ontario charities incorporated under…
This is a very interesting story of one donation to a non-profit. So much emphasis is given to the tax benefits of donating to charity even though studies show that for most donors it is a minor consideration. For some…
In order for Canadian charities to effectively achieve their objects or mandate they often need to engage in some “political” activities, especially when the objects or mandate require the assistance and support of government. It is important for Canadian charities…
Here is an interesting report from the Canadian Centre for Philanthropy (now Imagine Canada) entitled “An Analysis of Canadian Philanthropic Support for International Development and Relief” by Don Embuldeniya, David Lasby and Larry McKeown dated January 2002.
Here is part of a draft of the new T3010B which was included in a recent Bulletin of the CCCC. This part relates to the T3010B questions on foreign activities by Canadian charities with some of my comments in red.…
This article deals with the recent Canadian Federal Court of Appeal case Hostelling International Canada – Ontario East Region in which the Federal Court of Appeal upheld the CRA decision to revoke their charitable registration. Under the Canadian Income Tax…
There has been a lot of attention on the ups and downs of the market. Generally people who are heavily invested in the market feel good when their shares go up and not so good when their shares go down. …
This short note discusses why a major gift combined with a bequest to a Canadian registered charity may be more tax effective than just a bequest to that same charity. Let’s face it – few people donate to charity to…
Here are some interesting quotes on philanthropy. Every man must decide whether he will walk in the creative light of altruism or the darkness of destructive selfishness. This is the judgement. Life’s persistent and most urgent question is “What are…
Here are some statistics from the CRA dealing with the 83,000 registered charities in Canada as of the end of 2007. Numbers do not tell the whole story of how important the charitable sector is to Canada. However, they are…
The Newsletter “Global Giving Matters” published by the Synergos Institute and The World Economic Forum recently profiled globalphilanthropy.ca, along with one other organization – Alliance magazine, under the heading “Activities, websites and other cutting-edge information for global givers”. We modestly…
The CRA has released an updated T2050 – Application to Register a Charity Under the Income Tax Act and it is located at In this article I discuss the differences between the old and new application and guide. …
In this comment I encourage foundations to be more active in the current difficult economic times. Many are working hard with their partners in the sector to do just that. With the global meltdown of financial markets, we have seen…
Theo at Food Bank.pdf
CRA has prominently posted the following warning on its website: Under no circumstances should a registered charity lend its registration number to another organization for receipting purposes. A registered charity is responsible for all tax receipts issued under its name…
Here is a copy of my presentation Global Philanthropy: Canadians and Canadian Charities and Foreign Activities that I delivered to the Estate Planning Council of Toronto.
The problem of abusive charitable tax shelters using the developing world as a marketing tool continues. It just goes to show the importance of dealing with credible and legitimate charities if you want to make the world a better place.…
The CRA has reminded charitable organizations (not foundations) that these charitable organizations will beginning in 2009 have to in addition to other disbursement quota requirements need to spend 3.5% of the value of all of their property the charity has…
Although charities are greater than 10% of our economy in a federal election the charitable sector gets between 0 and 0.01 of the attention. We spend a lot of time talking about sweaters. In this blog I ask a few…