Order Fixing the Day on Which this Order is Made as the Day on Which Certain Provisions of the Budget Implementation Act, 2022, No. 1 Come into Force: SI/2024-8

Canada Gazette, Part II, Volume 158, Number 5

Registration
SI/2024-8 February 28, 2024

BUDGET IMPLEMENTATION ACT, 2022, NO. 1

Order Fixing the Day on Which this Order is Made as the Day on Which Certain Provisions of the Budget Implementation Act, 2022, No. 1 Come into Force

P.C. 2024-148 February 19, 2024

Her Excellency the Governor General in Council, on the recommendation of the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness and the Minister of National Revenue, under section 331 of the Budget Implementation Act, 2022, No. 1, chapter 10 of the Statutes of Canada, 2022, fixes the day on which this Order is made as the day on which sections 302, 304 to 306 and 308 to 328 of that Act come into force.

EXPLANATORY NOTE

(This note is not part of the Order.)

Proposal

This Order, pursuant to section 331 of the Budget Implementation Act, 2022, No. 1, chapter 10 of the Statutes of Canada, 2022, fixes the day on which this Order is made as the day on which sections 302, 304 to 306, and 308 to 328 of that Act come into force.

Objective

The purpose of this Order is to bring into force provisions of the Budget Implementation Act, 2022, No. 1, which introduced amendments to the Customs Act (CA or the Act) allowing for the electronic administration and enforcement of the CA. These amendments provide the authority for the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA or the Agency) and trade chain partners to communicate electronically, and to move away from existing paper-based processes in favour of electronic processes that will streamline the border experience for clients (travellers, commercial entities, etc.).

Additional amendments that come into force as part of this Order are to ensure consistency in language between the English and French text of the CA, remove potential ambiguities in the CA that could be misinterpreted, and clarify the authorities of the Minister and Governor in Council.

The Order supports the Government of Canada’s longstanding efforts to improve service delivery through digitalization, and also allows the CBSA to modernize and implement electronic solutions as part of border processing for both travellers and commercial clients.

Background

The CBSA is responsible for providing integrated border services that support national security priorities and facilitate the free flow of persons and goods. The CA is one of the key pieces of legislation governing the CBSA’s mandate to ensure the collection of duties and control the movement of goods and persons into and out of Canada. The CA does not impose duties. However, it does provide legislative authority to administer and enforce the collection of duties (including certain taxes) that are imposed under other Acts of Parliament (e.g. the Excise Tax Act, the Customs Tariff, etc.). The CA has been amended multiple times to increase flexibility to enable modernized processing for travellers, new trade and business practices, and to support the Government’s strategy to strengthen security and facilitate trade.

The Order brings into force the following amendments to the CA:

CBSA’s original intention was to have these legislative amendments come into force at the same time as other CA amendments in both the Budget Implementation Act, 2021, No. 1 and the Budget Implementation Act, 2022, No. 1 that link to the functionality of the CBSA Assessment and Revenue Management (CARM) system. Upon further consideration, bringing these provisions into force prior to the full implementation of the CARM system would allow for the introduction of electronic processes in areas of the Agency not impacted by CARM. This would benefit both the CBSA, trade chain partners and travellers in the immediate term, as it would allow them to move away from paper-based processes toward simplified electronic processes, where feasible.

Implications

Since 2020, the CBSA has focused on delivering electronic and streamlined services to travellers, commercial entities and trade chain partners. In 2022, the Agency launched the advance CBSA declaration feature in ArriveCAN, which allows travellers to complete their declaration electronically prior to arrival in Canada and benefit from a streamlined experience with fewer in-person interactions upon arrival at the border. The COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated the value and importance of allowing the CBSA to electronically administer and enforce the CA with respect to traveller processing.

Additionally, when the CARM project becomes fully operational, trade chain partners will have the ability to submit their accounting declarations with respect to the importation of commercial goods to the CBSA electronically through the use of the CARM client portal. Through electronic administration and enforcement of the CA, the CBSA will be able to meet stakeholder demands for improved delivery of services which make greater use of technology to facilitate and streamline compliance with border requirements.

This Order also allows the CBSA to reduce in-person interaction with clients for activities that can be completed electronically, such as the handling, sending, or receipt of documents, which is currently done in person, by mail or courier service. In the traveller stream, this Order allows the CBSA to address requests from stakeholders to transition away from paper-based processing and to embrace technological advancements that improve the border clearance process (e.g. use of email communication on the issuance of administrative monetary penalties).

While these amendments to the CA will allow technology to be leveraged to streamline components of border processing, all decisions rendered at the border pursuant to the CA will continue to be made by CBSA officers. Technology-based options for border management provide opportunities to facilitate travellers’ compliance with the government’s reporting requirements, which will strengthen border integrity. Further, these amendments will allow the CBSA to automate manual, burdensome processes and increase efficiencies in the allocation and management of CBSA resources, thereby allowing border services officers to focus on travellers and goods that present high and/or unknown risk.

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the unit within the CBSA that oversees the Agency’s recourse program and conducts administrative reviews of Agency decisionsfootnote 2 expanded its use of email communication as a way to supplement its existing processes for corresponding with stakeholders that rely on letter mail. The CBSA is planning to implement a new online portal to more effectively communicate with clients who have filed administrative reviews of Agency decisions, which would replace email communication. The online portal is expected to be available to the public within the 2024 to 2025 fiscal year. Reverting to only the legislatively required paper-based process would significantly increase processing time, compromise service standards and not meet requirements set in the Policy on Service and Digital, which require that departments must maximize online end-to-end availability of services, in order to make them faster, more accessible, personalized, secured, and more respectful of clients’ privacy.

The coming into force of these CA provisions is not expected to have differential impacts on the basis of sex, gender, age, race, ethnicity, sexuality, religion, and/or mental or physical disability.

There are no financial implications for stakeholders or the Government of Canada with this Order.

Consultation

Stakeholders were made aware of the amendments to the CA that are brought into force with this Order through various consultations (e.g. the Trade Chain Partner Working Group) and have been supportive of the CBSA transitioning away from paper-based processes toward electronic processes.

The modernization objective underpinning the new authorities to communicate electronically and move away from existing paper-based processes in favour of electronic processes that will streamline the border experience has been established in the public domain through proactive communications on the CBSA’s traveller modernization initiative.footnote 3

The CBSA has found the ability to communicate with stakeholders requesting administrative reviews of Agency decisions to be beneficial in administrating the CBSA’s recourse program. Clients have been supportive of the choice in electronic communication and, with more clients choosing to communicate with the CBSA electronically, the Agency has observed improvements in the administration of its recourse program, including reduced processing time and more timely correspondence.

Contact

Valerie Dinis
Acting Director
Commercial and Trade Policy Division
Canada Border Services Agency
100 Metcalfe Street, 10th Floor
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0L8
Email: CBSA.OCT/CECO.ASFC@cbsa-asfc.gc.ca