Will estate insurance become
recommended in most estates?
Insurance
Continued From Page 15
ered by the estate.
Since the estate itself can look
to the policy to be made whole
from the executor’s negligence,
without having to chase the
executor for damages, executors’
insurance should appeal to the
beneficiaries as well. In Zimmer-
man, the trustee ultimately died
before repaying the estate. In
The Globe and Mail, one of the
beneficiaries was quoted as say-
ing “I’m not sure that [we] will
recoup anything, but we’ll see.”
Will executor’s insurance
become like title insur-
ance — recommended as a mat-
ter of course in most estates?
Depending on the costs and the
coverage, it will likely appeal to
many of our clients. n
Jordan Atin is a mediator
and counsel at Hull & Hull
LLP in Toronto. He is the coauthor of The Family War —
Winning the Inheritance
Battle, and appears regularly
on Canada AM and the
Business News Network as an
expert on estate matters.
As in-house counsel, you know the answers to your colleagues’ questions most of the time. Use LexisNexis® Quicklaw® Corporate Counsel the rest of the time.
Try LexisNexis Quicklaw Corporate Counsel FREE for
15 days and get a FREE Butterworths® legal text (up
to a $160 value) for your time.*
As you transfer more work in-house, arm your team with a tool built
to meet their needs. Compare the only Canadian legal research tool
optimized for in-house counsel to what you currently use:
• Much more than case law with a Corporate Counsel Bookshelf,
forms, quantums and access to thousands of news sources like
the Economist Intelligence Unit, the Financial Post, The Globe
and Mail and The New York Times.
• Easy to register — no credit card information is required.
• Build confidence among your colleagues by answering their
legal questions quickly.
Call 1-800-255-5174
or register online at
www.lexisnexis.ca/inhousetrial.
LexisNexis and the Kno wledge Burst logo are registered trademarks of Reed Elsevier Properties Inc., used under licence. Quickla w
is a registered trademark of LexisNexis Canada Inc. Butter worths is a registered trademark of Reed Elsevier (U. K.) Limited and its
affiliated companies. © 2011 LexisNexis Canada Inc. All rights reserved.
* This offer is valid until April 20, 2011. Some restrictions may apply.
Compensation disclosure for
charities causes controversy
TERRANCE
CARTER
A private member’s bill introduced last year sought to impose a
compensation cap of $250,000 for
any executive or employee of a
charitable organization, as well as
for public and private foundations.
Bill C-470, An Act to amend
the Income Tax Act (revocation of
registration), was introduced
last March in the House of Commons by Albina Guarnieri, MP
for Mississauga East — Cooks-ville. Impetus for Bill C-470 had
come from reported news stories
by the Canadian press on purported excessive salaries by a
small percentage of charities. At
the second reading of Bill C-470,
Guarnieri cited an Oct. 1, 2009
news story from the Toronto
Star, which reported that the
former president of SickKids
Foundation had apparently
received $2.7 million on leaving
the organization.
Unlike the recent consultation
process involving the charitable
sector that lead to the disbursement quota reform in the March
2010 federal budget, Bill C-470
involved no consultation with the
charitable sector leading up to its
introduction. Nevertheless, Bill
C-470 initially received support
from the Liberal Party, the Bloc
Québécois and the NDP, and
passed second reading on April
21, 2010. The bill was then
referred to the Standing Committee on Finance for review in November 2010.
The standing committee commenced hearings last November,
at which time amendments to the
bill were introduced by Guarnieri. The proposed amendments
to Bill C-470 included the elimination of the $250,000 compensation cap as a result of strong
opposition from the charitable
sector and the introduction of a
threshold of $100,000 for the
compensation disclosure requirements. At a further hearing of the
standing committee on Dec. 6,
2010, members of the charitable
sector continued to voice their
opposition to the bill in its original, as well as amended form.
Nonetheless, the standing
committee recommended an
amended version of Bill C-470
to the House of Commons last
December. The bill currently
awaits third reading, expected
sometime this spring. The
amended Bill C-470 no longer
includes a compensation cap
provision, and a disclosure floor
of $100,000 has been added.
“
Bill C-470 is seen
as a redundant and
intrusive legislative
initiative that will add
little to the disclosure
of compensation
by charities...
The definition of “compensa-
tion” to be added to subs.
149.1(1) of the Income Tax Act
would encompass “salaries,
wages, commissions, bonuses,
fees and honoraria, plus the
value of taxable and non-tax-
able benefits.”
The committee made further
amendments to the bill which
had not been recommended by
Guarnieri. The amended Bill
C-470 expands the compensa-
tion disclosure requirement to
all executives or employees of a
charity who receive $100,000 in
compensation or more, rather
than only the five highest-paid
employees receiving compensa-
tion of $100,000 or more. The
$100,000 disclosure floor is
proposed to be indexed for 2012
and following taxation years.
The committee also made it
mandatory for the minister to
make salary disclosures avail-
able to the public, but added an
allowance for ministerial discre-
tion not to do so where “it is
otherwise justified.”
Many within the charitable
sector are still concerned about
the implications of Bill C-470,
even in its amended form. There
are already substantial compen-
sation disclosure requirements
that all charities must make in
their annual T3010 return, but
without requiring disclosure of
the specific name of an employee
or executive of a charity.
Terrance Carter is the managing partner with Carters Professional Corporation in Orangeville,
Ont. and Toronto. He is counsel to
Fasken Martineau DuMoulin
LLP on charitable matters and
editor of charitylaw.ca.
