Canadian Bankers’s Association president and CEO, Ray Protti, has added his voice to the growing chorus in favour of national financial services regulation.

In an article in the latest issue of the Canadian Banker, and its first online issue, Protti says, “This proliferation of regulatory regimes requires armies of industry and government staff to manage the complexities of rules that may duplicate one another or contain subtle but important differences. It undermines efforts to improve Canada’s productivity and competitiveness.

Protti notes that the patchwork approach short changes consumers and is “inefficient in a market where the distinctions among financial services providers and the products and services they offer are increasingly less relevant”.

“Although individual governments have introduced important policy changes, the regulatory system for the sector as a whole has not kept pace with the velocity of change over the past decade. It is abundantly clear that we need a new approach to regulation,” he says.

“National regulation of financial services offers a way of eliminating overlap and duplication, improving services to consumers, and strengthening the efficiency of the regulatory system as a whole. If regulators and legislators work together with financial institutions to create a national system of regulation, we can address both the prudential and the market conduct/consumer protection objectives that underpin financial regulation.”

“Canada needs to find a more productive and efficient way to meet the interests of consumers, financial institutions and governments. As we cut our way through the thicket of multiple regulation, we need not open the Pandora’s box of constitutional amendments. We can and should explore different and creative approaches as we seek a new way to regulate. It is time to get on with the job of building a national financial services regulatory system for Canada.”