We explained recently that Imagine Canada had reported further guidance from Industry Canada about CASL's charitable fundraising exception.
Imagine Canada has issued a further update reporting that it has been contacted by the CRTC (one of the other entities responsible for regulating CASL), and that the CRTC indicates that it interprets CASL's fundraising exception differently from Industry Canada. Although the CRTC has yet to provide any official guidance, it apparently has indicated that it will be releasing an FAQ about charities in the next few weeks (though presumably after CASL is already in force).
This episode highlights an ongoing problem with CASL's implementation, namely, a lack of comprehensive guidance on CASL's many intricacies, combined with ongoing inconsistency in the guidance that has been issued by various regulators.
We will have to wait and see how the CRTC interprets CASL's charity rules. In the meantime, it seems that charities cannot necessarily rely on Industry Canada's interpretation as reported by Imagine Canada – although to what extent remains unclear.
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