Fatima Laher is the Deputy Chair & Board Director of Deloitte Canada and Chile. She is widely recognized as a trusted advisor to multinational corporations navigating complex business challenges, with a particular focus on corporate governance and the modernization of boards. Fatima, on behalf of the Board, will be responsible for the Succession of the CEO and Chair, Deloitte Canada and Chile in 2026.

With a career spanning multiple continents, Fatima has advised clients across Canada, the U.S., Europe, India, Asia, South America, and South Africa. Her global perspective and deep expertise allow her to bring practical, future-focused insights to both boardrooms and executive teams.

Over the span of her career, Fatima has authored and published numerous articles and has been recognized with multiple client service awards, reflecting both her thought leadership and her unwavering commitment to excellence.

At Deloitte, she has held a wide range of senior leadership roles, including National Tax Clients and Industry Leader, Global Tax Innovation Leader, National Tax Strategy Leader, South African Practice Leader, Global Employer Services and Immigration Leader, Audit Practice Leader, and DE&I Growth Leader for Deloitte Canada. Each role has showcased her ability to drive transformation, foster innovation, and strengthen client relationships.

Away from the boardroom, Fatima was once a provincial gymnast in South Africa and is also a trained pastry chef—a balance of discipline and creativity that continues to shape her approach to leadership today.

Dr. Jack M. Mintz is the President’s Fellow of the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary after serving as the Palmer Chair and founding Director from January 1, 2008, to June 30, 2015. He is a member of the board of directors of Mackenzie Health, York Region Ontario, Canada West Foundation and the Aristotle Foundation for Public Policy. In 2024, he has been appointed by the Alberta Minister of Advanced Education to chair of the panel on postsecondary education financing and Alberta’s competitiveness.

Dr. Mintz is also a Distinguished Senior Fellow, MacDonald-Laurier Institute, Senior Fellow at the C.D. Howe Institute, and research fellow at International Tax and Investment Centre in Washington D.C., CESIfo Germany and Oxford’s Centre of Business Taxation. He is a regulator contributor to the Financial Post and is a member of the editorial board of International Tax and Public Finance.

Dr. Mintz held the position of Professor of Business Economics at the Rotman School of Business from 1989-2007 and Department of Economics at Queen’s University, Kingston, 197889. He was a Visiting Professor, Columbia Law School, 2015; New York University Law School, 2007; President and CEO of the C. D. Howe Institute from 1999- 2006; Clifford Clark Visiting Economist at the Department of Finance, Ottawa; and Associate Dean (Academic) of the Faculty of Management, University of Toronto, 1993 – 1995. He was founding Editor-in-Chief of International Tax and Public Finance, published by Kluwer Academic Publishers from 1994 – 2001.

He chaired the federal government’s Technical Committee on Business Taxation in 1996 and 1997 that led to corporate tax reform in Canada since 2000. He also served on numerous panels and boards at the federal and provincial levels including Vice-President and chair of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council 2012- 2018, chair of the Alberta Financial Investment and Planning Advisory Commission 2007, Research Director on Retirement Income Adequacy of Federal-Provincial-Territorial Ministers of Finance, and member of the federal Panel on Healthcare Innovation 2014-5. He recently chaired the Alberta Premier’s Economic Recovery Council from March 2020 to July 2022 and was a member of the Alberta Health Services board June 2021 to November 2022.

In the past he served on corporate boards including Brookfield Asset Management (2002-2012), Morneau Shepell (2010-2020), CHC Helicopter (2003-2008) and Imperial Oil (2005-2023). He has consulted widely with the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, and various governments, businesses, and nonprofit organizations in Canada and abroad, including serving as National Policy Advisor for EY Canada from 2015 to 2021.

Dr. Mintz became a member of the Order of Canada in 2015 as well as receiving the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2012 for service to the Canadian tax policy community and Queen Elizabeth Platinum Medal in 2023 for his advice in support of Alberta’s economic recovery. He has been recognized by Who’s Who Legal as one of the top global experts on corporate taxation since 2016 and Alberta Venture magazine as one of the most influential Albertans in 2008 and 2010.

Heather Scoffield is the first CEO of the Canadian Tax Observatory. She has devoted her career to writing and public engagement around economic policy. Over the course of her 30-year career in journalism, she covered monetary and fiscal policy, economics, trade, environment and energy. She was the Ottawa bureau chief and economics columnist for the Toronto Star, where her writing focused on political economy and its effect on people. Heather was also the Ottawa bureau chief for The Canadian Press, leading an award-winning team of political journalists. Before joining CP in 2009, she spent 12 years at the Globe and Mail covering policy and economics. More recently, she was senior vice-president of strategy at the Business Council of Canada, collaborating with business leaders and policymakers to find practical solutions to the economic challenges of our time. Heather has a master’s degree in journalism from Western University and a BA in international relations from York University. She is a senior fellow at the University of Ottawa’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs and a frequent contributor to the Toronto Star’s business section, among other media.

Patrick Brethour has written on economics, business and politics and business across the country for nearly three decades, including, most recently, his award-winning coverage of tax and fiscal policy.

Patrick has covered the rise and fall of the dot-coms, Alberta’s oil boom and the spectacle of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. He was deputy editor of Report on Business, and then senior news editor, before heading to New Brunswick in 2014.

There, as editor in chief of Brunswick News, he led the organization to multiple national and regional journalism awards, including a Michener nomination for coverage of the deficiencies of New Brunswick's child-care system.

He returned to The Globe in 2017 as a senior news editor, moving to the tax and fiscal policy beat in 2019. As editorials editor, he is responsible for The Globe’s daily editorials – a key voice in the national debate.