Finance Committee on May 24th, 2018

[Nada Semaan]

That's exactly what we want to work with businesses on. As you have noted, the banking sector, the major reporter sector, actually has put a lot of these systems in place. A lot of the reports we get, whether it be the large cash transactions or others, just happen automatically so there is a lot less of a burden.

How can we work with the smaller guys to figure out how to do something similar for them that will be a lot less of a burden? This is an area that we're very interested in.

I mentioned earlier that we're also developing a new analytics modernization system. That system, which should be implemented later on this year, will enable us to have higher quality and more effective and timely responses to our law enforcement partners in terms of being able to provide actionable reports.

We are using technology, and we will continue to use technology, but we also need to work with the reporting entities. Some of the smaller ones—the honourable member mentioned the jewellery store—might not have the same technology as others. We need to find a way to work with the technology based on the capacity of each of the reporting entities that we work with. There will be a number of tools we will have to look for.

[Francesco Sorbara, Liberal, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

In terms of FINTRAC's sharing best practices, can you give a quick view of how we are with our international partners? Could you comment on that?

[Nada Semaan]

Yes. We work very closely with our international partners and share best practices all the time. As a matter of fact, we are looked at as one of the best financial intelligence units worldwide. Many times people come to us for best practices.

Project Protect, which Mr. MacKillop identified and I mentioned in my opening remarks, is a private-public partnership. Together with banking institutions, money service bureaus, and our law enforcement, we were able to deal with some very hard circumstances for Canadian women in the human trafficking area. We are now working on Project Guardian, which aims to deal with the trafficking of fentanyl, which is a very serious problem as well. People are asking us to go around the world to explain the process and how it works because of the results we've received.

As to the analytics system we've received, again, we got that as a best practice from one of our international partners and we enhanced it. Now we have other international partners coming to us and asking to take a look at our analytics system. Anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing is a fight worldwide, so we work very collaboratively internationally.

[Francesco Sorbara, Liberal, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

As a final question, are there any top-of-mind recommendations that you think the committee should consider in terms of our money-laundering and proceeds of crime review?

[Nada Semaan]

I don't have anything top of mind, but I do want to thank the committee. I think the work you're doing and the number of witnesses you're speaking to is very heartwarming for us. We want to hear your recommendations. We want to know what your thoughts are.

As well, I believe a lot of our ideas are out in the report that Finance put out. The comments coming back from that will inform us quite a bit.

Going to some of the comments, I do believe that even with new regulatory requirements or legislative requirements, we do have to balance the requirement to get that data with the administrative burden. That's something we're very cognizant of and very cautious of. Your ability to look at the two sides of the burden—I know you're very concerned about it—is very welcomed.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you.

For committee members' interest, we're back to the regular schedule next week, which people will welcome.

On Monday we have the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada, and on Wednesday we have the final witnesses on this study before we do our travel on this study.

For the Wednesday meeting, we need to finalize the budget for pre-budget consultations in the fall. We need to determine a theme that we would put out in June for people to consider on pre-budget consultations. People might want to think about that between now and the meeting on Wednesday. We have to have our budget in by next Friday, so that's being worked on.

With that, thank you very much, Ms. Semaan, Mr. MacKillop, and Mr. Beaudry.

The meeting is adjourned.