Canada's insurance regulators have a new three-year playbook - one built around emerging risks, tighter rule alignment, and leaner governance.
That is the message from the Canadian Council of Insurance Regulators, which released its Strategic Plan for 2026 to 2029 on May 12, 2026. The plan will steer national regulatory collaboration across all provinces and territories, with the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions sitting in as an associate member.
After years of building out the basics - guidance documents, data tools, supervisory frameworks - CCIR says it is narrowing its lens. Three priorities now anchor the work ahead.
The first is risk monitoring. CCIR plans to keep refining the Annual Statement on Market Conduct, the common industry filing that gives regulators a national view of how insurers are behaving. It also wants to expand information sharing among regulators and figure out what role it should play when a crisis hits. Quarterly meetings with Assuris and PACICC are on the agenda, too.
The second priority is alignment. CCIR will keep running joint supervisory reviews under its Cooperative Supervisory Framework, and where those reviews turn up gaps in how insurers are meeting expectations, the council says it will speak up. The plan also commits to weighing recommendations from the International Monetary Fund's Financial Sector Assessment Program when looking for places to tighten alignment with global standards.
The third priority is housekeeping. CCIR will review its committees and working groups to make sure they are actually serving the strategic plan, and lean on the Regulatory Policy Committee to keep everything on track.
The backdrop, as the plan describes it, is not exactly calm. Economic and geopolitical volatility, natural catastrophes growing more frequent and more expensive, fast-moving technology, and consumers who expect more - all of it is pressing on insurers and the people who regulate them.
Patrick Déry, CCIR Chair and Superintendent of Financial Institutions at Quebec's Autorité des marchés financiers, said effective insurance regulation plays an important role in protecting Canadians and supporting a strong and resilient Canada. He pointed to heightened geopolitical tensions, economic uncertainty, and evolving systemic risks - an environment that calls for a careful, measured, and forward-looking regulatory approach.
The plan also leans into harmonization. CCIR spells out four levels of alignment it can pursue - coordination, convergence, mutual recognition, and standardization - and notes that the deepest version may require legislative changes by member jurisdictions. Close work with the Canadian Insurance Services Regulatory Organizations and the Canadian Securities Administrators continues, and the Autorité des marchés financiers and OSFI keep CCIR linked to the International Association of Insurance Supervisors.
The full text of CCIR's 2026-2029 Strategic Plan is available at https://www.ccir-ccrra.org/Documents/View/4043.
