2015 Annual Directors' Dinner: The Honourable Howard I. Wetston, QC, Chair of the Ontario Securities Commission
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The Institute’s annual Directors’ Dinner is a premier event for discussion of major policy issues among Canadian business and thought leaders. This year’s event also recognizes an outstanding policymaker: Howard Wetston, who has been at the helm of the OSC since 2010. Howard talked to the group about the challenges he has faced as the regulator of Canada’s largest capital markets as well as the road ahead.
Mr. Wetston is a respected public servant and a distinguished lawyer, jurist, regulator and executive. He is one of Canada’s most prominent leaders in administrative law and regulation with deep expertise in securities, energy, competition and other regulated industries.
He has been the Chair & CEO of the Ontario Securities Commission since 2010, was the Chair & CEO of the Ontario Energy Board from 2003 to 2010, and was a Vice-Chair of the OSC from 1999 to 2004. The OSC and OEB are two of the largest and most complex industry regulators in Canada.
In addition to his duties as OSC Chair, Mr. Wetston is a Vice Chair of the Board of the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO). IOSCO is the leading international policy forum for securities regulators and is recognized as the global standard setter for securities regulation.
Mr. Wetston was granted the title “Honourable” after an exemplary six years as a Trial Judge at the Federal Court of Canada and Ex-officio Judge of its Appeal Division.
He was appointed Q.C. during his seven years as a prominent regulator working up to the level of Director of Investigations & Research (now Commissioner of Competition) at the federal government’s Bureau of Competition Policy.
He spent the first 12 years of his career as a lawyer achieving the positions of General Counsel at the Canadian Transport Commission and Assistant General Counsel at the National Energy Board. Mr. Wetston was also General Counsel and Program Director at the Consumers’ Association of Canada. Before that, he was a Crown Counsel in Nova Scotia and at the federal Department of Justice. He has worked in private practice in Montreal and Calgary and articled in private practice in Halifax.
In addition, Mr. Wetston is a member of the Advisory Board for The Program on Ethics in Law and Business at the University of Toronto and is a member of the Shannon School of Business Advisory Board at Cape Breton University. He was a lecturer of competition law and regulated industries at the University of Ottawa for seven years.
Mr. Wetston holds an LL.B. from Dalhousie and a B.Sc. from Mount Allison and has been called to the Bar in Nova Scotia, Ontario and Alberta. He holds the ICD.D designation from the Institute of Corporate Directors. He holds honorary doctorate degrees from Cape Breton University and Dalhousie University.
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