Outcome Statement: CDIC promotes transparency, accountability, and governance best practices in our work to maintain the trust of depositors.
Anchor Initiatives
- CDIC has well-developed corporate governance
- CDIC has established a governance framework for CDIC’s ESG Strategy
1. Ensuring CDIC has well-developed corporate governance
As a federal Crown corporation, CDIC has a well-established governance framework as prescribed by the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation Act (the CDIC Act). To continue strengthening the governance framework, CDIC has previously completed a comprehensive review of the Corporation’s governance structure and practices to ensure they continue to be forward-looking and world class. CDIC will continue to regularly review its governance framework and practices.
CDIC’s governance framework is also supported by the Board Charter, which outlines the Board’s role and responsibilities as stewards of the organization. Guided by its Charter, CDIC’s Board of Directors aims to earn the trust of depositors, the Minister and Parliament by using its combined skills and experiences to make careful, rational, and well thought out decisions that fulfil CDIC’s mandate, while always acting honestly and in good faith with the best interests of the Corporation and depositors in mind. The Board Charter is reviewed annually to ensure it continues to reflect best governance practices.
To measure the Corporation’s progress in maintaining and strengthening its governance framework for the purposes of the ESG Strategy, CDIC will use the results of two annual Board review activities.
The first is the Board’s review of its work against its Board Charter requirements. The Board conducts a review of its performance, as well as the performance of its committees, vis-à-vis their charter obligations, and a compliance report is tabled with the Governance and Human Resources Committee on an annual basis.
The second is the annual assessment of the Board to ensure that directors have the necessary skills, knowledge and training, as well as a diversity of backgrounds and experiences, to enable them to discharge their strategic oversight role and related responsibilities effectively. The assessment also ensures members of CDIC’s Board are representative of the Canadians they serve, with a particular focus on diversity, geographical representation, and requisite skills. These assessments are conducted by third-party governance advisors, to ensure independence of the process, methodology, and delivery of results. Both Board Directors and Management participate in the information-gathering phase of the assessments, to obtain diverse feedback on Board performance.
In addition to these reviews, CDIC’s governance framework is supported by its Code of Conduct, Conflict of Interest Policies, and governance best practices as included in the Financial Administration Act. CDIC’s Board, its senior leadership team, and all its employees are bound by these policies. CDIC employees and Board Members must attest to their compliance with the Code of Conduct and Conflict of Interest policies annually. These policies help all CDIC employees navigate how they deliver on their work, uphold their obligations to the Corporation, their colleagues, and the depositors CDIC serves, as well as support individual and collective decision making, particularly if employees face ethical dilemmas.
CDIC employees and Board members receive annual training on the Corporation’s Code of Business Conduct and Ethical Behaviour guidelines, as well as the Conflict-of-Interest guidelines, and are required to sign a declaration annually that they are in compliance with each.
CDIC updated its Code of Conduct in 2022 to ensure it continues to reflect best practices, and committed to all employees that the Corporation will review the Code every three years going forward. The ESG Strategy will track the review process as a key metric to ensure the Code continues to provide proper guidance to all employees and Board members.
Key metrics - Ensuring CDIC has well-developed corporate governance
For detailed information on this pillar, please refer to the related documentation.
2. CDIC has established Board and Executive Oversight of the ESG Strategy
A key part of the development of CDIC’s ESG Strategy was the establishment of the Strategy’s governance framework. CDIC’s Board of Directors—which is responsible for the overall stewardship of the Corporation and ensures that significant business risks are identified and well managed—assigned oversight of the ESG strategy to the Board’s Governance and Human Resources Committee (GHRC).
In addition, members of CDIC’s Executive Team are accountable for the Corporation’s overall ESG Strategy, and a working group of senior leaders has been convened to coordinate the development and maintenance of the ESG Strategy.
To ensure CDIC’s ESG Strategy governance framework continues to provide effective oversight, the GHRC will review the Strategy on an annual basis. The Strategy will track as a key metric whether this review is completed at last once per fiscal year.
Key metric - CDIC has established Board and Executive Oversight of the ESG Strategy
Related documentation
Governance Pillar
Ensuring CDIC has well-developed corporate governance - Contributing Activities
Governance Strategy - Scorecard