The Royal Commission's members consisted of Scottish jurist Lord Macmillan, Bank of England director Sir Charles Addis, Canadian former Finance Minister William Thomas White, Banque Canadienne de Montréal general manager Beaudry Leman, and Premier of Alberta John Edward Brownlee.

The bank's purpose was set out in the preamble to the act: "to regulate credit and currency in the best interests of the economic life of the nation, to control and protect the external value of the national monetary unit and to mitigate by its influence fluctuations in the general level of production, trade, prices and employment, so far as may be possible within the scope of monetary action, and generally to promote the economic and financial welfare of the Dominion".

In 1938, while William Lyon Mackenzie King was serving as prime minister, the bank was legally designated a federal Crown corporation.

Prime Minister John Diefenbaker's central-bank monetary policy was directed towards increasing the money supply to generate low interest rates, and incentivize full employment.

[25] Following the 2008 recession, the central Bank of Canada lowered interest rates to stimulate the economy, but did not practice quantitative easing, as it feared that dramatically increasing the money supply would lead to hyperinflation.

[26] Between 2013 and early 2017, the Bank of Canada temporarily moved its offices to 234 Laurier Avenue West in Ottawa to allow major renovations to its headquarters building.

[27] In mid 2017, inflation remained below the bank's 2% target, (at 1.6%),[28] mostly because of reductions in the cost of energy, food and automobiles; as well, the economy was in a continuing spurt with a predicted GDP growth of 2.8 percent by year end.

"The economy can handle very well this move we have today and of course you need to preface that with an acknowledgment that of course interest rates are still very low," Governor Stephen Poloz subsequently said.

"Future adjustments to the target for the overnight rate will be guided by incoming data as they inform the bank's inflation outlook, keeping in mind continued uncertainty and financial system vulnerabilities.

"[31][32] Poloz refused to speculate on the future of the economy but said, "I don't doubt that interest rates will move higher, but there's no predetermined path in mind at this stage".

By October 2021, the Central Bank stopped its practice of quantitative easing, and accelerated the timeline of increasing interest rates to pre-pandemic levels.

[10] In practice, however, it has a more narrow and specific internal definition of that mandate: to keep the rate of inflation (as measured by the Consumer Price Index) between 1% and 3%.

[45] The most potent tool the Bank of Canada has to achieve this goal is its ability to set the interest rate for borrowed money.

[50] The Bank of Canada's books are audited by external auditors who are appointed by the Governor in Council on the recommendation of the minister of finance.

[53] In December 2015, the Bank of Canada forecasted increasing annual growth throughout 2016 and 2017, with the Canadian economy reaching full capacity mid-2017.

With this annual growth, the bank estimated the effective lower bound for its policy interest rate to hit approximately 0.5 per cent.

[54] While the Bank of Canada avoided using UMP in 2008–09 and during the European debt crisis, quantitative easing policies were introduced in early 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

These measures are in place so, in the improbable circumstance the economy is hit with another significant negative financial shock, the Bank of Canada has principles it can reference.

In order for this to be effective, the Bank of Canada would provide collateralized funding to others at a subsidized rate as long as they met specified lending objectives.

The Bank of Canada believes the Canadian financial market is capable of functioning in a negative interest rate environment and, as such, added it to its toolkit for unconventional monetary policy measures.

These newly created unconventional measures will work towards finding a solution to a problem in whichever combination of policies is judged appropriate at the given time under their unique circumstances.

These unconventional measures, and the sequence in which they would be adapted, are designed to minimize market distortions, as well as risk to the Bank of Canada's balance sheet.

With the exception of matters of personal conduct ("good behaviour") the Bank of Canada Act does not provide the government with the direct ability to remove a governor during his or her term in office.

[63] The Conservative Party of Canada leader, Pierre Poilievre, had criticized Tiff Macklem and the Bank of Canada during his candidacy, accusing the institution of being "financially illiterate" for forecasting that there would be deflation as opposed to inflation during the pandemic,[64] to which the bank's deputy governor Paul Beaudry responded by stating "The aspect that we should be held accountable is exactly right".