Overview of the Regulatory Compliance Ontario
Lina Cimarrusti, BJ Alvey
Ontario Public Service
Since it’s inception in 2014, Regulatory Compliance Ontario (RCO) has become a leader in driving regulatory and enforcement collaboration efforts within and outside the Ontario Public Service.
Our mission is to collaborate with the purpose of strengthening regulatory, compliance and enforcement capacity in Ontario. We aim to develop a modern regulatory culture that embeds the principles of the 2020 Regulators’ Code of Practice (the Code).
The Code is a set of principles that have been adopted by Ontario regulators as a common set of principles to guide their efforts to protect the public.
Each year, RCO trains and promotes the Code and the principles of the modern regulator to field staff across the 16 regulated ministries including Ministry of Transportation (MTO), Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks (MECP) and Ministry of Labour Training and Skills Development (MLTSD), to name a few. In addition, RCO has delivered training to partner agencies including public health units.
As we continue to create space for regulators to collaborate and to find innovative solutions to common problems, we have begun to see the successes of RCO’s collaborative efforts.
The COVID-19 pandemic brought compliance personnel and the municipal and provincial regulatory community together to advance COVID safety compliance and enforcement across Ontario. Regulatory Compliance Ontario (RCO) served as an enterprise ‘hub’ bringing collaboration across ministries to establish the Multi-Ministry Team (MMT) and agency partners. The result was a coordinated inter-ministry and inter-agency approach to addressing a shared problem (COVID) that saw relationships developed with local public health units, municipal by-law department and police services and across the OPS regulatory community.
The MMT highlighted the importance of a collective understanding of programs, processes, and compliance approaches across agencies regulatory organizations to share best practices and identify innovative and collaborative solutions.
RCO’s presentation will:
- Tell our story from inception to now
- Describe the Regulators’ Code of Practice
- Introduce the RCO’s training programs including the Modern Regulator Program, which is available for Public Health Units (PHU’s)
- Identify key collaborations with PHU’s including Multi Ministry Teams Campaigns and Regional Regulatory Hubs
