House Committee on Foreign Affairs Recommendations in Response to COVID-19
March 2021 Charity & NFP Law Update
Published on March 25, 2021

By  Jennifer M. Leddy

The House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development (the “Committee”) released its report, “Part 1 of A Study on the Aftershocks of the COVID-19 Pandemic—The Humanitarian Burden: Ensuring A Global Response and Reaching the Most Vulnerable”, in February 2021 (the “Report”).

Prior to preparing the Report, the Committee heard from a number of individuals and organizations, including representatives from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees,  World Vision Canada and UNICEF Canada, among others.

The Report makes ten recommendations to the Federal Government. The Report recommends, among others, that Canada play a lead role in the global response to COVID‑19, increase its contribution to international humanitarian appeals in line with growing demands on the humanitarian system, and to “take immediate steps to ensure that a diverse range of Canadian civil society organizations, including small and medium-sized organizations and those that are new and long-established partners, can apply for and receive federal funding to deliver international assistance as part of the global response to COVID‑19 and related humanitarian appeals, and that the associated application and approval processes reflect the principles of timeliness, flexibility, partnership, efficiency, cost‑effectiveness, innovation, and accountability”.

As well, Recommendation 7 of the Report, joins the increasing calls for reform of the administrative requirements around direction and control, calling for the Government of Canada to “take immediate steps to fix the serious problems with the current direction and control regime as it pertains to international development, recognizing that this regime impedes important international development work and perpetuates colonial structures of donor control”. For more on the issues with and increasing calls for reform to the direction and control regime, see Charity & NFP Law Bulletin No. 488.

Read the March 2021 Charity & NFP Law Update