Competition Bureau’s draft guidance on environmental claims and greenwashing provisions
This submission addresses how environmental claims are regulated, helping ensure clarity for investors while avoiding duplicative oversight for securities-regulated‑ firms.
Submission – Competition Bureau – consultation – environmental claims and the Competition Act – draft guidance
Recipients
- Competition Bureau – Deceptive Marketing Practices Directorate
Industry segments this resource supports
- Assets management
- Capital markets
- Wealth management
Summary
Our submission responds to the Competition Bureau’s draft guidance on environmental claims and greenwashing provisions under the Competition Act. We support the goal of ensuring environmental claims are accurate and not misleading, but we emphasize that securities regulators already have a comprehensive legal and enforcement framework governing ESG-related disclosures by investment funds, asset managers, and dealers. The submission urges the bureau to defer to the jurisdiction of the CSA and CIRO to avoid regulatory overlap, uncertainty, and unintended consequences for ESG‑-related‑ disclosures and sustainable investment products.
Why this matters: This submission addresses how environmental claims are regulated, helping ensure clarity for investors while avoiding duplicative oversight for securities-regulated‑ firms.
Key takeaways
- We support the bureau’s objective of improving accuracy and credibility in environmental claims.
- The submission highlights that Canadian securities regulators already enforce strict rules prohibiting misleading or unsubstantiated claims, including ESG-related‑ disclosures.
- We ask that the bureau’s final guidance formally defer to CSA and CIRO oversight for all securities-regulated ‑communications to prevent duplicative standards.
- We recommend a broad carve‑out for all documents and communications governed by securities laws, including sales communications.
- We warn that without clear deference, firms may reduce voluntary ESG disclosures or limit sustainable investment products due to regulatory uncertainty.
- The submission references the existing MOU between the bureau and the OSC as a model for coordinated oversight.
Our position is that effective regulation should enhance transparency without creating unnecessary burden or conflicting requirements.
