Crown corporation

In Canada, Crown corporations (French: Société de la Couronne)[1] are government organizations with a mixture of commercial and public-policy objectives.

[4][5][6] Each corporation is ultimately accountable to (federal or provincial) Parliament through a relevant minister for the conduct of its affairs.

They can provide services required by the public that otherwise would not be economically viable as a private enterprise or that do not fit exactly within the scope of any ministry.

[6] They are involved in everything from the distribution, use, and price of certain goods and services to energy development, resource extraction, public transportation, cultural promotion, and property management.

[9] Crown corporations are generally formed to fill a need that the federal or provincial government deems in the national interest or not profitable for private industry.

[6] Some Crown corporations are expected to be profitable organizations, while others are non-commercial and rely entirely on public funds to operate.

[4] Prior to the formation of Crown corporations as presently understood, much of what later became Canada was settled and governed by a similar type of entity called a chartered company.

These companies were established by a royal charter by the Scottish, English, or French crown, but were owned by private investors.

The first Crown corporation was the Board of Works, established in 1841 by the Province of Canada to construct shipping canals.

Western Canada's early railways were all run by privately owned companies backed by government subsidies and loans.

Resource and utility crown corporations also emerged at this time, notably Ontario Hydro and Alberta Government Telephones in 1906, and SaskTel in 1908.

A notable anomaly of this era is Canada's only provincially owned "bank" (though not called that for legal reasons) Alberta Treasury Branches, created in 1937.

Perhaps the most controversial was Petro-Canada, Canada's short-lived attempt to create a national oil Crown corporation, founded in 1975.