Molly Reynolds and Tyson Dyck Provide Insight on Evolving Regulatory Landscape

Counsel Molly Reynolds and partner Tyson Dyck spoke with Lexpert in an article that focuses on the growing regulatory and compliance burden, especially as it pertains to cross-border business and organizations’ abilities to protect themselves from harm.

The article lists three areas of regulatory compliance that are top concerns for in-house counsels and their business—CASL, privacy, and environment.

Speaking with Lexpert, Molly said she didn’t think there was going to be extensive legislative reform when it came to CASL.

Molly continued, saying in-house counsel could be re-focusing their efforts in the regulatory enforcement area and focusing on record keeping.

“Organizations really should be keeping a database on when they received the consent and what the basis or the consent is for every person on their email list,” Molly said.

The article also touches on the fact that the number of complaints the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) receives about an entity plays a huge role in the regulatory investigations.

“If organizations spent a bit more time arming their customer-facing employees with how to respond and internally how to fix issues for those who don’t want to receive messages, they could actually be lowering the complaints significantly and lower the risk of getting an investigation,” she said.

“In many cases, the concern isn’t that the organization has been subject to a CRTC investigation but that they cannot prove their compliance through sufficient documentation.”

Tyson shared his thoughts on the regulatory landscape around the environment, particularly in regard to extreme weather events.

“People haven’t experienced these types of weather events so severely or so close together in the past, and I think that this is at least driving a conversation,” Tyson told Lexpert.

“There’s been more of an appetite for government regulation only to see it fall anyway,” he added.

Tyson also commented on the fact that a series of climate change initiatives are being put into action across Canada and said most of his U.S. clients were “looking at some operations in Canada, whether actually operating facilities or looking in companies already regulated and trying to figure out what it means.”

Tyson deals with clients that are able to deal with and integrate regulations once they are in place because they provide some indication of the costs that they will face and manage in their operations.

“What I think concerns some clients is the uncertainty around where those costs might go in the future,” he said.

Molly and Tyson, along with other members of our team, have provided more insight on Privacy, and the Environment on the relevant practice pages.