Streamlining Data Mobility and Saving Costs

 

A Submission to Industry Canada’s Digital Economy Strategy Consultation By XBRL Canada

 

 

This submission sets out the case for the Government of Canada to take a leadership role in the development of programs that would require the use of XBRL for the filing of information with government departments and agencies. Such programs are often referred to as Standard Business Reporting (SBR). The submission summarizes the growing numbers of countries around the world that are implementing or have implemented such programs, including the UK, the Netherlands, Australia, most EU countries, Singapore and others. It also points to the considerable savings that can be achieved – 25% or more of the cost to business of compliance with government filing requirements. Moreover it highlights the savings to government of utilizing technology to actually process those filings to a much greater extent, thus saving the time of human resources and enabling their attention to be directed to the more important issues rather than administrative processing routines. The submission also offers some broad guidance as to how to formulate an initiative towards such programs.