Self-regulated professions

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Appendix 3: Recommendations

Below are all the recommendations found in chapter 3–7. Readers are encouraged to consult the individual chapters for the context for each recommendation.

Accountants

Entering the profession

• The provincial and territorial accounting organizations should, when establishing or reviewing regulatory requirements, set the lowest acceptable time requirements for completing elements of the qualification process. In doing so, the organizations should benchmark their requirements against those in jurisdictions with the lowest time requirements that are still achieving the desired level of competence.

Mobility

International mobility

• The provincial and territorial accounting organizations should continue to review foreign accounting designations in order to expand the list of qualified foreign accounting designations, while minimizing all barriers to the accreditation process.
• Regulators should consider removing residency requirements for foreign-trained accountants who wish to be public accountants in Canada.

Overlapping services and scope of practice

• Provincial regulators should give all members of accounting designations who have the appropriate level of competence the right to practise the full extent of public accounting.
• The Ontario Public Accountants Council should be flexible when applying the new standards under the Public Accounting Act in order to give members of all designations who have the equivalent training and education the right to practise public accounting.

Advertising

• Provincial and territorial restrictions on advertising by accountants should start from the premise that all advertisements are permitted except those that mislead or misinform the public. Provincial and territorial accounting organizations should consider removing any restriction that does not explicitly serve this purpose.
• The provincial and territorial accounting organizations should consider eliminating all solicitation restrictions that go beyond protecting the public from persistent, coercive or harassing solicitation.

Pricing and compensation

• All Chartered Accountant organizations should consider eliminating Rule 204.4(34) of the CA Rules of Professional Conduct and Related Guidelines , which gives conditions as to when CAs may perform engagements for a significantly lower fee than that charged by predecessors.
• The provincial and territorial accounting organizations should consider whether restrictions on compensation for referrals are needed to maintain and preserve public accountants' independence. If so, the organizations should consider whether this restriction could be replaced with self-imposed safeguards.

Business structure

• Given the variance in business structure restrictions between provinces, each regulator should consider whether its current rules on business structure and ownership are necessary. Those that go beyond the minimum necessary to achieve a clearly defined public interest objective should be removed.
• Regulators should look at ways to allow public accountants to work with non-accountants without jeopardizing the public interest.

Lawyers

Entering the profession

• Law societies should justify the duration of the professional legal training course and articling as the minimum necessary to properly and effectively practise law while protecting the public interest. When reviewing the duration of education and training lawyers require, law societies should look at other law societies that have maintained the quality of legal services while requiring shorter periods for training and articling.

Mobility

Interprovincial mobility

• Law societies should facilitate the movement of lawyers between jurisdictions to ensure complete temporary and permanent mobility throughout Canada. To do so, the Quebec Bar should implement, and the territories should sign and implement, the National Mobility Agreement.

International mobility

• The law societies that require their members to be residents or Canadian citizens should consider following the example of law societies that have not considered it necessary to include such requirements and eliminate these restrictions.
• The law societies of Quebec, Northwest Territories, Yukon and Nunavut should adopt rules enabling foreign lawyers to act as foreign legal consultants.
• Law societies should remove the residency requirements for foreign legal consultants. Local presence should not be necessary.

Overlapping services and scope of practice

• To the extent that paralegals need to be regulated, the proper avenue for this is not through the law societies, given the obvious conflict of interest that arises from having one competitor regulate another. Alternative means of regulatory oversight should be explored.
• Law societies should neither prohibit related service providers (such as paralegals and title insurers) from performing legal tasks, nor limit their ability to do so, unless there is compelling evidence of demonstrable harm to the public.

Advertising

• Generally, law societies should lift any unnecessary restrictions on advertising—that is, any restriction above and beyond the prohibitions on false, misleading and deceptive advertising—unless they can justify their existence. In particular, law societies should remove restrictions on the size, style and content of advertisements and allow non-lawyers to be compensated for referring services or clients.
• Law societies should evaluate the possibility of adopting a specialist certification program similar to that in Ontario. Alternatively, law societies could consider allowing members to be identified as leading practitioners in publications that rely on data from independent parties approved by the law societies' ethics committee, as is the case in Saskatchewan.
• Law societies should abolish prohibitions on comparative advertising of verifiable factors, such as price.

Pricing and compensation

• The Quebec legislature should consider repealing the provision of the Professional Code that gives professions the right to suggest a tariff of professional fees that the members may apply.
• Law societies should identify the goals of the restrictions on contingency fees in certain practice areas, and then determine whether the restrictions are the best means of achieving the desired goals, considering that other law societies have not deemed such restrictions necessary.
• The law societies of British Columbia and New Brunswick should consider eliminating the maximum percentage to which lawyers are entitled under contingency fee agreements. The appropriate fee structure should be left to market forces to determine.

Business structure

• Law societies should consider less intrusive mechanisms than prohibiting multidisciplinary practices to circumvent possible conflicts of interests. Examples to follow are those of the Law Society of Upper Canada and the Barreau du Québec , both of which allow lawyers to form partnerships with non-lawyers, under certain conditions and appropriate regulation.
• In order to allow for multidisciplinary practices, law societies will have to remove restrictions that currently prohibit or discourage lawyers from working in multidisciplinary arrangements with other professionals. Instead, they should allow the following:
  • lawyers to split, share or divide clients' fees with non-lawyers;
  • lawyers to enter into arrangements with non-lawyers regarding sharing fees or revenues generated by the practice of law; and
  • law corporations to carry on activities other than providing legal services or services directly associated with providing legal services.
• Law societies wishing to take a more conservative approach should consider allowing lawyers, under specific conditions, to share premises, facilities and staff with non-lawyers, as is the case in Saskatchewan.

Optometrists

Entering the profession

• Provincial and territorial colleges of optometry should consider ways to ensure that conditions of supply and demand in Canada are taken into account in the formulation and development of the Accreditation Council on Optometric Education's accreditation policies .
• The provincial ministries of education should review the current number of university places for optometry students to determine whether it is adequate to meet current and future demand for optometry services in Canada.
• The provincial and territorial colleges of optometry must justify any proposed increase in the required entry qualifications for prospective optometrists as being the minimum necessary for consumer protection.

Mobility

Interprovincial mobility

• Every province and territory should sign the Mutual Recognition Agreement (MRA) to facilitate the movement of optometrists throughout Canada. Non-signatories should clearly articulate the features of the MRA that are currently preventing them from signing on to the agreement so that all provincial and territorial colleges of optometry can co-operate in order to extend the MRA to the rest of the provinces and territories.

Overlapping services and scope of practice

• Regulators should determine the overall costs and benefits of extending opticians' scope of practice to include measuring refractive error for low-risk consumers and dispensing eyewear based on the results, including the potential costs in terms of public safety and the potential benefits in terms of lower prices, increased choice and consumer access to eye care services.
• Regulators in those provinces and territories that continue to prohibit optometrists from prescribing therapeutic pharmaceutical agents should assess the necessity of such restrictions in light of their relaxation in most of Canada and the United States. As with the recommendation to review the proposed extension of opticians' scope of practice, the costs and benefits of any such extension for optometrists should be carefully considered.

Advertising

• Provincial and territorial colleges of optometry should review existing restrictions on advertising and remove those that go beyond prohibiting false or misleading advertising. The restrictions that colleges maintain should be clearly linked to a reduction in consumer harm.

Pricing and compensation

• Colleges and associations of optometry should discontinue publishing suggested price lists, given their potential harm to competition, in favour of allowing individual optometrists to set their own prices.

Business structure

• Colleges of optometry should remove restrictions that prohibit or discourage optometrists from working in multidisciplinary arrangements with opticians.

Pharmacists

Entering the profession

• In light of the anticipated changing demand for pharmacy services in Canada, universities should regularly review the number of places available in their pharmacy programs to ensure an adequate supply of pharmacists.
• To avoid unnecessarily high practical experience requirements, provinces whose requirements take longer to complete than those of other provinces should look to the experience of those provinces to determine whether an acceptable level of quality could be achieved in less time.

Mobility

Interprovincial mobility

• The National Association of Pharmacy Regulatory Authorities should continue its efforts to have Quebec sign the Mutual Recognition Agreement.

International mobility

• Each provincial college or board of pharmacy should review whether it has minimized its admission requirements for certifying foreign-trained pharmacists who otherwise meet the qualification requirements. Such a review should look to provinces with less onerous admission requirements that continue to meet quality standards.
• Each provincial college or board of pharmacy should make efforts to identify foreign jurisdictions whose trained pharmacists meet admission requirements. In addition, all provinces should work towards a nationally recognized, formal bridging program, similar to the ones offered by the University of Toronto and the University of British Columbia.

Overlapping services and scope of practice

• In order to increase efficiency while still maintaining adequately safe pharmacy operations, provincial colleges and boards of pharmacy should allow individual pharmacists to decide the number of pharmacy technicians they will employ in their pharmacies. The colleges and boards that stringently limit the use of pharmacy technicians in pharmacies should consider the provinces that allow for the greatest use of pharmacy technicians as having taken the least restrictive approach, which they should adopt.

Advertising

• Colleges and boards of pharmacy should remove restrictions on price advertising unless they can show a clear link to a meaningful reduction in consumer harm by such restrictions.
• Provincial colleges and boards of pharmacy should eliminate all restrictions on advertising that go beyond protecting consumers from false or misleading advertising, including prohibitions on all forms of comparative advertising.

Pricing and compensation

• In provinces where suggested fee schedules for pharmacists exist, they should be removed.

Business structure

• The provincial colleges and boards of pharmacy should review their restrictions on the ownership and business structure of pharmacies with a view to eliminating unnecessary obstacles to efficient business models.

Real estate agents

Entering the profession

• Regulators should look towards their counterparts in other provinces, territories and jurisdictions when deciding the level of education necessary to obtain a real estate agent licence, or maintain it, and the length of the work experience required to apply for a broker's licence. In particular, regulators should consider implementing non-mandatory pre-licensing courses similar to those the Quebec real estate council is currently considering.

Mobility

Interprovincial mobility

• Every province and territory should sign the current Mutual Recognition Agreement or any modified version of it to facilitate the movement of real estate agents between jurisdictions. Provinces and territories that do not wish to sign such an agreement should at least establish requirements to facilitate the movement of real estate agents between jurisdictions.

International mobility

• Yukon should consider removing the requirement contained in section 5(1)(c) of the Real Estate Agents' Licensing Regulations that individuals be residents for at least three months prior to applying for a real estate licence.

Overlapping services and scope of practice

• Legislators should consider legislative amendments to give force of law to the current policy of exempting from licensing requirements any “for sale by owner” companies and advertisers that are not involved in real estate transactions.

Advertising

• Restrictions regarding any form of advertising should not go beyond protecting consumers from false or misleading advertising.

Pricing and compensation

• The Ontario legislature should allow real estate agents to charge a combination of a percentage and a fixed amount when pricing their services under the Real Estate and Business Brokers Act, 2002, in order to better serve all customers. Other provincial legislators should also clearly allow such pricing by removing the or in the appropriate section of their laws.

Business structure

• To promote more competition among real estate agents, regulators should reconsider the necessity of making a distinction between brokers, and agents and salespeople. Alternatively, regulators could explore options that would allow agents to become more independent.
  

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