Business Law Blog

In May, 2018, we published a blog post on amendments to the Canada Business Corporations Act relating to diversity of boards and senior management. In keeping with its continued focus on gender diversity in corporate Canada, on September 27, 2018, the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) published CSA Multilateral Staff Notice 58-310 outlining key trends from a recent review of corporate governance disclosure for public companies for the years 2014-2018.

The Staff Notice set out the following key findings as at 2018:

1. Only 15% of board seats were occupied by women (up from 11% in 2014);
2. Women filled only 29% of board vacancies;
3. 16% of issuers have now adopted targets for representation of women on their boards (as compared to 7% in 2014); and
4. 66% of issuers now have at least one woman on their board (an increase from 49% in 2014).

Given this data on gender diversity, the CSA is now considering whether to introduce guidelines for corporate governance practices or make changes to the existing disclosure requirements. However, no decisions have yet been made by the CSA.

If you have any questions about the current disclosure requirements relating to gender diversity on boards or in senior management positions, or the Canadian corporate governance regime more broadly, please contact any member of our Corporate Governance or Corporate Finance and Securities Group.