One Country, One Licence

October 2026

The Federal, Provincial and Territorial Ministers

Committee on Internal Trade, Canadian Free Trade Agreement

c/o Internal Trade Secretariat

Dear Ministers,

We write as Canada’s economy faces a test it has not met in a generation. With trade negotiations with the United States suspended and tariffs weighing on Canadian firms, governments across the country have rightly turned their attention inward, to the barriers we impose on ourselves. More than $530 billion in goods and services crosses provincial and territorial borders every year, almost 20 per cent of our GDP. By the federal government’s own estimate, removing internal barriers could add up to $200 billion to the economy over time.

The progress is real. The Free Trade and Labour Mobility in Canada Act came into force on January 1, 2026. In August, ministers ratified amendments to the Canadian Free Trade Agreement setting a 30-day service standard for labour mobility applications, and committed to an agreement in principle on model mutual recognition legislation by the end of this fall. We commend that work. We write to ask that it be carried through to the people on whom so much of our economy depends: Canada’s regulated professionals.

One country, many gates

Nurses, physicians, engineers, accountants, teachers, lawyers, pharmacists, social workers and skilled tradespeople are licensed one province or territory at a time. A professional fully qualified in Manitoba is, in law, a newcomer in Saskatchewan. Moving across a provincial line can mean new applications, new fees, new examinations and weeks or months of waiting, for work the professional has already been doing safely for years.

Canada has shown that a better model is possible. The Red Seal program lets certified tradespeople carry one credential across the country. In 2002, Canada’s law societies signed the National Mobility Agreement, among the earliest commitments by any profession to a simple idea: a professional qualified in one province should be able to serve clients in another. These models prove the principle works. But they remain the exception, applied unevenly, and too often outside the framework that ministers are now strengthening.

Why it matters now

Tariffs do not respect provincial borders, and neither do the businesses absorbing them. A manufacturer in Ontario with a supplier in Alberta and a buyer in Nova Scotia needs engineers, accountants and lawyers who can follow the work wherever it goes. A hospital facing a staffing crisis cannot wait months for a nurse already licensed next door. A small exporter rerouting its trade to new markets needs expert advice today, not after a lengthy registration process.

The stakes extend beyond commerce. Rural, northern and remote communities, where professionals are already scarce, depend on practitioners willing to travel to them. Francophone communities outside Quebec depend on bilingual professionals who can cross provincial lines to serve them in their own language. When foreign markets close, the speed at which Canadian expertise can move becomes economic infrastructure.

What we ask of the Committee

1. Make one licence the rule, not the exception. Advance model mutual recognition legislation so that a professional in good standing in one province or territory can practise in another, subject only to narrow, published exceptions justified by public protection.

2. Hold every regulator to the 30-day standard. Apply the new service standard to all regulated professions, including those, such as law, that govern themselves under separate mobility agreements.

3. Make decisions timely and transparent. Any refusal, delay or condition placed on an interprovincial applicant should be issued in writing, with reasons and a clear avenue of review.

4. Modernize temporary practice. Allow professionals to serve clients and patients in another jurisdiction on a temporary or virtual basis without full re-registration, reflecting how work is now delivered across the country.

5. Protect service in both official languages. Give priority to the mobility of bilingual professionals serving official language minority communities.

6. Measure progress. Report annually, by profession, on interprovincial applications, processing times and refusals, so that Canadians can see the barriers coming down.

Public protection and mobility, together

None of this requires governments to weaken the standards that protect the public, or to supplant the independence of self-regulating professions, including the independence of the bar, a cornerstone of the rule of law. A professional who is safe to practise in Halifax is safe to practise in Hamilton. We ask only that every regulator be held to the same standards of timeliness, transparency and accountability that ministers now expect of the economy as a whole.

In a tariff era, Canada cannot afford thirteen separate markets for professional skill. Our tradespeople and our lawyers have shown the country what is possible. It is time to finish the work for every profession.

We would welcome the opportunity to meet with you and your officials, and to convene the regulators, professionals and employers who understand this issue best.

Respectfully,

Saron Gebresellassi, J.D., M.Ed., B.A., N.P., Cert. TESOL

Principal, Gebresellassi Private Office

gebresellassi.com

cc: Federation of Law Societies of Canada; Red Seal Program (Canadian Council of Directors of Apprenticeship)

Sources

Committee on Internal Trade, Communiqué, August 27, 2026, Canadian Free Trade Agreement (cfta-alec.ca).

Government of Canada, “Government of Canada removes barriers to interprovincial trade and labour mobility,” November 2025 (canada.ca).

Free Trade and Labour Mobility in Canada Act, in force January 1, 2026.

Federation of Law Societies of Canada, National Mobility Agreement (2002).

Red Seal Program, Interprovincial Standards (red-seal.ca).

All open letters