3. Establishing a Comprehensive Set of Principles for Consumer Protection Self regulation through IIROC and the BCSC has proven to be a recipe for impunity for industry. The complaint desks from these self regulators have been instructed to avoid any discussion of violations of the criminal statutes, and this forces the vulnerable, duped client to rely on an extremely expensive civil trial process. "Should the government adopt a set of principles to govern financial consumer protection that would be applicable even where regulations have not been enacted?" The government would be best advised to instruct political representatives and law enforcement to understand the law on fraud and deception, and when these officials are given information of breaches of the rules, that they investigate the evidence in good faith, and forward it to other levels of the regulative system, having vetted the important details. Currently, the track record of the police has been to make cold calls to the people who have been named as perpetrating bad faith, and to ask these people if they cheated the client and to accept a verbal denial, and to the say the matter was investigated and closed. This is not police work, it is aiding and abetting crime. How should a set of principles be administered? By re-instituting common law standards on contract nullification when there is evidence of deception of any kind, and to demand that regulators operate on an open case law based process that restores precedent use, and enables cases to be fully documented and publicly available. Financial institution stewardship of the consumer's interest. Get discussion and action to acculturate the G20 High Level Agreement referred to in this document to be made part of the business culture in Canada. There must be some demonstration of willingness to do this at the MP level. So far, it has been only all talk. Access to financial services: We need to support public banking initiatives at the municipal level, and we need to get the federal government to release and support the 811 page internal Canada Post study that says that if financial services are expanded, that there would be no need for home delivery cuts. The government needs to act in good faith, and answer the simple question: how else can banking services be made available in remote areas that do not have branches of any of the chartered banks? "What should be included in a set of principles that would form the basis of financial consumer protection?" Getting consensus on the use of the criminal code as the basic regulative tool. What elements should be set out under each principle to ensure that the principles are meaningful, measurable and fair to consumers and financial institutions. Get rid of all the ambiguity in the regulative process, and eliminate the reliance of the securities commissions on financing from the industry, particularly for staff salaries. This is admitted as a form of regulatory capture. 4. Possible Enhancements to the Existing Framework Eliminate the capricious, secretive and unaccountable SRO model. There must be serious consequences for failing to supervise wayward brokers, when there has been a commitment by a company to carry out such close supervision. Companies like Investors Group, that advertised in their newsletter CONNECTIONS, they have a federally regulated under the Superintendent of Financial Institutions, a division that provides GICs, [in a 2009 edition], and in fact they have not had authority to do this from that federal registration office since 2004, are are not being scrutinized by the governance structure in Canada. What are the unique challenges faced by vulnerable populations? It is clear that as in the IG example above, the elderly and easily mislead population are being targeted for bait and switch schemes. They are offered no risk instruments, and then have their savings locked in for seven years in things that are market volatile. The regulators appear to think this is acceptable business practice. The consumer code can address the above problem by ending all the ambiguous language in the procedures manuals of these companies. "Shoulds" ought to be replaced by "musts" when it comes to standards of business ethics. "Accessing financial services and advice from remote locations can be challenging, although this can be mitigated where alternative service delivery channels are available." Banking in remote parts of the country is not feasible when the chartered banks abandon remote regions. The only logical alternative is to enable the post offices to provide public banking services, as CUPW is advocating. So far there has been no valid argument offered to counter this proposal, and the Federal Government must support a measure such as this that is in the vital interest of remote rural residents. "Would it be useful to have in legislation a broad standard of responsibility for financial institutions to consumers, and, if so, what level of care should consumers expect from financial institutions?" It is essential that anyone offering securities sales be bound to a fiduciary duty to provide the highest level of honest services and to always act in the best interests of the client. The regulative function must ensure that clients are asked independently of the sales agents, if they have received what they were asking for. This step will require that the client be informed of precisely what they have been sold, and this needs to be told objectively, without the sales agent being allowed to dispense puffery to what the client is being told. Then the client needs to be asked if that is what they expected would be in their portfolio. "What tools and authorities will the FCAC need in order to effectively supervise and enforce the implementation of a principles-based financial consumer protection framework?" * modules of practical instruction to all levels of government and all law enforcement that there is a duty of care to all citizens to ensure that criminal abuses are investigated, vetted, and forwarded to more enforcement levels of justice. It must be universally accepted that this is not an option. Law enforcement requires that it is a duty to the community that everyone take measures to ensure that every person's rights are upheld. [Article 29 Universal Declaration on Human Rights.] This would sweep away the buck passing that currently is practiced by agents of government departments throughout the Federal apparatus. * Willingness on the part of the Department of Justice to join as an interested party, actions that protect the financial interests of veterans and seniors. It is urgent that the Federal Government consciously act to enforce the needed standards of engagement that will stop elder abuse. Consumers need to have a federal consumer protection network that is fully conversant in the requirements of the criminal code and the common law on contract. It should never be allowed that regulators refuse to enforce, and to collaborate in the enforcement, of good faith business practices that are necessary in the protection of vulnerable clients. "How should the consumer protection framework accommodate emerging technologies and financial products? The system needs to actively listen to the consumer media like FAIR, and the Facebook page "Investment System Fraud", and the newsletter FUND OBSERVER. It is essential that uncensored feedback on products be taken into account by the regulatory system. 4.6 Access to Financial Services. The system needs to be actively encouraging municipally owned public banks. The banking regulatory networks need to acknowledge that banking does not always have to be private hands. There is an excellent case to be made that public banking adds solidity to the range of banking providers. In summary, the financial consumer code needs to be very simple and direct in requiring that the Criminal Code be known and used by everyone in the financial and securities field. There must be no incentive to try and push the limits of what will be tolerated, and the current system does provide this destructive form of encouragement, because it is too vague - and deliberately ignores the application of the criminal statute. This has been identified as being endemic in many regulative offices in BC, and it only encourages further testing of the limits. This model is inherently causing erosion of confidence, and is impairing the future of the economy by creating needless lack of confidence in the level of fidelity of the providers of services. Submitted 11:35 PM Friday, February 28, 2014 XXXX