GOVERNMENT OF CANADA MUST PROTECT CONSUMERS OF BANKING SERVICES AGAINST FRAUD AND ABUSE BY BANKS

Hello,
My name is Svetlana Fotinov. I live in Canada in the Province of Ontario. I am terminally ill and I know that I do not have time left to launch this petition and campaign for it. My husband will do it.
I am asking you to support the two measures that we have requested the federal government to implement because I do not want anybody anywhere to go through the hardship and suffering that my family has to endure as the result of fraud committed by our bank of 30 years, − Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) that operates in 40 countries. These measures will protect consumers of banking services from fraud and violations of their human rights by banks.
Thank you for your support.
Svetlana Fotinov
March 29, 2019

Svetlana died on April 11, 2019. Her premature death was caused by the brutal treatment to which she was subjected by RBC and government authorities when she exposed − and proved with financial documents − fraud committed by RBC, with which we had a mortgage on a house, and came very close to exposing collusion between the bank and the authorities that made this fraud possible.
The world she lived in for the last 6 years of her life as she fought against injustice, for her rights as citizen and as consumer of banking services resembled in many ways the world depicted by George Orwell in Nineteen Eighty-Four, with one significant distinction: besides Big Brother there was also Big Bank in that world.

In my letter to Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that I wrote following Svetlana’s death I describe this world where Injustice is Justice. I describe the unprecedented steps that the bank and the authorities undertook to cover up the fraud committed by Canada’s largest bank that is one of 30 most systemically important banks in the world. You can read the letter Dear Prime Minister, Please Dismantle Our Orwellian Canada here

The first measure that we requested the federal government to implement concerns the right of bank clients to access financial information pertaining to their accounts. This measure is outlined in an excerpt below from our letter to the Minister of Finance of Canada Bill Morneau who is responsible for the Canadian banking sector. We explained in the letter why the proposed measures were important to financial and personal security of consumers of banking services. You can read the letter here

The second measure is described in the petition GOVERNMENT OF CANADA MUST BAN FORCED EVICTIONS DURING EXTREME HEAT WAVES THAT ENDANGER HUMAN LIVES. I urge you to read and sign it.

Canada is the only jurisdiction in the world where government authorities and courts allow federally regulated financial institutions − banks − to carry out forced evictions of older adults with heart conditions during extreme heat waves when public health authorities issue warnings that the heat waves can be lethal for such vulnerable persons.

I am asking you to sign this petition for the following four main reasons.

REASON I. COMFORTABLE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE REGULATOR,
THE REGULATED AND THE COURTS

Our case brings to light a serious societal problem that exists in Canada. Svetlana took the fight against injustice, for her rights as citizen and as consumer of banking services to the federal courts, − all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. Since the lawsuit that she launched against RBC in the Federal Court of Canada was a political case because it concerned government policies in the banking sector and banking practices of the financial institution regulated by the federal government, judges in the Federal Court of Canada, the Federal Court of Appeal of Canada and the Supreme Court of Canada went to great lengths searching for pretexts to reject the evidence of their eyes and protect the public image of Canada’s largest bank. My letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau contains links to relevant court documents demonstrating the need for the proposed measures that, if implemented, will enable judges to render decisions grounded in fact rather than in considerations of political correctness.
The comfortable relationship that exists in Canada between the regulator of the banking sector – the federal government – and the banks, the willful blindness of law enforcement agencies and courts with regard to fraudulent banking practices give banks freedom to act with impunity. The consequences of this de facto institutionalization of bank fraud − when the regulator, the courts and the police view fraud as a banking practice that does not merit punishment − can be tragic for those who entrust banks with their investments. This also undermines public trust in the banking system and compromises its integrity.

REASON II. LACK OF LEGAL GUARANTEES ENSURING ACCESS, BY CONSUMERS OF BANKING SERVICES, TO FINANCIAL INFORMATION PERTAINING TO THEIR BANK ACCOUNTS

Currently there are no laws obligating banks to submit to their clients, upon request, financial information pertaining to their accounts, as there are no laws that punish banks for concealing or withholding from their clients this information. In case of litigation it may cost bank clients thousands of dollars in lawyer’s fees to extract this information from their banks, if ever.
As our case graphically demonstrates, the freedom to withhold financial information from the client, to deny the client on-line and branch access to the client’s accounts granted to banks by the regulator of the Canadian banking sector − the federal government − enables banks to manipulate this information to defend their interests – or commit fraud.

If unchecked, fraud can escalate to criminal fraud. The techniques employed by RBC to engineer the fraudulent foreclosure – which is a criminal offence − are described in detail in our Request for Criminal Investigation that we submitted to the Canadian federal police, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP). You can read the Request for Criminal Investigation here. (LINK!)
The RCMP, being aware of the fact that Svetlana, the primary mortgage holder and a key witness in this case, was terminally ill, chose to wait for her death instead of investigating the criminal fraud committed by RBC. We wrote a letter to the Minister of Public Safety of Canada Ralph Goodale who is responsible for the RCMP asking the Minister to evaluate the position taken by the RCMP with regard to the criminal fraud committed by RBC and the abuse, by the bank, of its clients, senior citizens. You can read this letter here.

REASON III. LACK OF EFFECTIVE INSTRUMENTS TO PROTECT THE RIGHTS OF CONSUMERS OF BANKING SERVICES

The only G7 country where the banking sector is regulated by the federal government, Canada lacks effective instruments with which consumers of banking services, including mortgage holders, can protect themselves against fraudulent banking practices.

• The two federal agencies − the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada (FCAC) and the Ombudsman of the Banking Services and Investments (OBSI) have limited mandates. FCAC’s mandate has been reduced to that of a “financial education” agency, while the OBSI does not have the authority to bind banks to comply with its compensation recommendations benefiting consumers wronged by their banks. Besides, two of Canada’s major banks – RBC and Toronto Dominion − decided to stop resolving disputes with their clients through the OBSI. At the same time annual reports by the OBSI demonstrate a steady increase of consumer complaints about banking services, with mortgage products and related fees and penalties being the main banking complaints.

• The so-called “consumer provisions” of the Bank Act of Canada are vague and are routinely ignored by banks and courts. My letter to the Prime Minister contains links to relevant court documents that prove this point.

• The voluntary codes of conduct that the banks have are precisely this, − non-binding instruments that banks feel free to ignore to protect their interests. The court documents listed in the above-mentioned letter to the Prime Minister prove this point, too.

REASON IV. VIOLATIONS OF HUMAN RIGHTS OF CONSUMERS OF BANKING SERVICES

Bank fraud inevitably leads to violations of human rights of the bank’s clients − victims of fraud – whom the bank treats differently than its other clients, thus discriminating against those have been wronged by the bank.

Whichever country you live in, I am urging you to sign our petition and share it with your friends and colleagues. We should not allow our governments to ignore or cover up fraud and abuse by banks. Banks should not enjoy immunity from punishment for fraud and violations of human rights of their clients.
By supporting our petition you will help ensure the right of consumers of banking services to financial information pertaining to their bank accounts; you will help ensure protection against potential fraud and abuse by banks.

Thank you.

Vadim Fotinov

EXCERPT FROM THE LETTER TO BILL MORNEAU, MINISTER OF FINANCE OF CANADA, DATED JANUARY 9, 2019
Dear Minister Morneau,
We are asking you as the Minister responsible for the Bank Act, an Act respecting banks and banking, taking into account skyrocketing prices of houses in Canada and the fact that they are the main investment for the majority of Canadians, in order to protect the interests of consumers of banking services – mortgagors,
1) to take steps to introduce provisions into the Bank Act that would obligate federally regulated financial institutions such as banks to provide to clients, at first request, financial information pertaining to the state of their mortgage account such as the balance on that account, mortgage payments and allocations to principal and interest. Instances where banks withhold such financial information from clients should be made public.
Statements of the State of the Mortgage Account must be provided immediately upon the mortgagor’s request, particularly in case of a dispute, and online access to the mortgage account must be ensured by the financial institution to the mortgagor at all times. This financial information is essential for mortgagors to effectively defend their interests in courts in case of legal disputes;
2) to take steps to introduce legislation that would ban federally regulated financial institutions from evicting mortgagors, and especially seniors living in rural areas, from their homes at times of extreme weather events such as heat waves given the impact of heat waves on health and the risk extreme heat poses to life. This measure is necessary due to the increased frequency of severe weather events, including Extreme Heat Events (EHEs) that are becoming more deadly, the growing number of seniors in Canada, and the societal interest in preventing additional health care costs that are easy to avoid taking reasonable precautions when Environment Canada, Public Health Agency of Canada and provincial public health authorities issue heat warnings.
These measures would protect the rights and interests of Canadian consumers of banking services, would contribute towards protecting senior citizens in this country from fraud and financial abuse by federally regulated financial institutions.
These provisions would ensure national standards applicable to banking services, would strengthen public confidence in federally regulated financial institutions, in banking products and banking services offered by banks, and thus would be in the national interest.
Our experience demonstrates that, as things stand now, it is possible for a bank to obtain a court order for the forced eviction of the mortgagor from their house by withholding essential financial information from the mortgagor, by blocking online access to the mortgage account to the mortgagor, and then submitting to the court false financial information regarding the mortgage account and making false statements in court with the purpose to obtain the court’s decision desired by the bank, − and the mortgagor cannot expose falsehood because the bank withholds from the mortgagor essential financial information: the balance on the mortgage account, mortgage payments, allocations to interest and principal.
It is unacceptable that RBC, the financial institution regulated by the federal government of Canada, does not provide to its client (the mortgagor) essential financial information when the mortgagor requests such information.
In the case of Svetlana Fotinov, the principal mortgage holder, RBC has been withholding − for six (6!) years now − the financial statements pertaining to the mortgage account that she requested.
It is appalling that RBC continues to withhold essential financial information from the senior citizen in poor health – the fact known to RBC – in the hope that the senior will die and RBC’s actions will never be exposed, that the fraudulent foreclosure committed by RBC will never come to light.
Taking into account the facts of the case mentioned above and the ease with which RBC repossessed the house for which the mortgagor made payments to RBC for 10 years – and did it by falsehood and by withholding from the mortgagor key financial statements pertaining to the mortgage account − we firmly believe that it is necessary to introduce into the Bank Act the provisions mentioned in 1) above, and provide for stiff penalties where banks do not comply with these provisions...