A legislative effort is underway in Canada to enact a ban on a central bank digital currency (CBDC) in the country.
Bill C-400 (Framework on the Access to and Use of Cash Act), spearheaded by the Conservatives, aims to prevent the creation of a CBDC and ensure that cash is guaranteed to remain an option for citizens.
Related: Central Bank Digital Currencies make authoritarianism, censorship, and surveillance easy
The bill has three main goals: access to cash that cannot be revoked in the future, a ban affecting the Bank of Canada Act preventing the central bank from creating a digital Canadian dollar, and another amendment – that of the Currency Act, which now gives the finance minister the right to “suddenly put out a call that all bank notes be recalled.”
With C-400, that power now in the minister’s “portfolio” would be restricted, reports say.
The bill’s sponsor, MP Ted Falk, explained the need for such legislation saying it was necessary to make sure cash continues to be available as an essential part of their daily lives to millions in Canada.
This is particularly true of vulnerable categories of the population, he said, but also charities, non-profits, and remote communities.
Last but not least – “In a world where governments, banks, and corporations are increasingly infringing on the privacy rights of Canadians, cash remains the only truly anonymous form of payment,” Falk argued in favor of C-400.
As their adoption is pushed globally, CDDCs remain a point of contention between governments and large financial institutions who support them, and opponents that include political entities, as well as security and civil rights advocates.
One of the former financial institutions is Canada’s central bank, BOC, which has gotten the ball rolling with a trademark filing for a “digital dollar.”
But Falk’s initiative is likely to be welcomed by most people in Canada, as a previous poll commissioned by the central bank itself showed a large majority against a Canadian CBDC and at the same time telling both BOC and the government to “leave cash alone.”
Canada’s Conservatives have pledged that, if their leader Pierre Poilievre becomes prime minister in the next election, any plans for both (centralized) digital currency and mandated digital ID would be scrapped.
Bill C-400, meanwhile, passed the first reading in June.
