Archive for the 'Immunity Program' Category
March 6, 2017
I receive quite a few inquiries about how the Competition Bureau (Bureau) works, what kinds of claims can be made under the Competition Act and how to report potential competition law violations to the Bureau (and what remedies are available). One topic I find I am increasingly discussing with both potential clients and other counsel is whistleblowing. So I thought I would post a short summary of whistleblowing and the Competition Act.
January 24, 2017
In my new Canadian Lawyer column today, I discuss the whistleblower provisions of the Competition Act and ask whether rewarding whistleblowers would help keep procurement markets competitive in light of increased infrastructure spending. Below is an excerpt with a link to the full column.
May 2, 2014
The Canadian Competition Bureau (Bureau) announced earlier today that criminal charges have been laid in a federal government IT contract-related bid-rigging case. According to the Bureau, the charges relate to allegations that an IT services company, its former owner and several former employees, as well as several former federal government employees were involved in an illegal bid-rigging arrangement relating to the provision of IT services to Library and Archives Canada.
April 8, 2014
Earlier today, the Competition Bureau announced that one company and two individuals have pleaded guilty to price-fixing under the Competition Act in relation to an ocean freight cartel (see: here). According to the Bureau, these pleas relate to a price-fixing cartel for various ocean freight related surcharges (including surcharges for currency exchange rate fluctuations and fuel) in operation from 2005 to 2011, which included agreements on rates or formulas used to calculate rates for various surcharges.
March 30, 2014
Canada’s Competition Bureau has issued a number of new anti-cartel (Competition Act conspiracy) compliance materials, including an updated version of its Bid-Rigging Pamphlet and two new pamphlets: a Competitor Collaboration Pamphlet (a more comprehensive set of Bureau enforcement guidelines on this topic already exists) and an entirely new Trade Associations Pamphlet.
The Bureau had been planning to issue a standalone Bulletin on associations several years ago, but has evidently opted to rely on the association related discussion in its Competitor Collaboration Guidelines and this newly issued short pamphlet. The Bureau has also issued a new video on competition law compliance.
January 4, 2014
Strategies for discouraging and enforcement against competition law cartels (e.g., price-fixing, market allocation, bid-rigging and other illegal agreements between competitors) have ranged from promoting compliance programs to competition agency immunity and leniency programs to increasing cartel penalties to deter anti-competitive agreements that interrupt the natural operation of markets. Price-fixing and other cartel agreements however, it seems from recent enforcement agency statistics both in Canada and elsewhere, continue to flourish despite such strategies. Addressing this issue, this interesting new article by Constantine Cannon (entitled Bring in the Whistleblowers and Pay Them) queries whether paying corporate whistleblowers for disclosing illegal cartel activities makes more sense than, for example, incentivizing parties to report and cooperate with authorities with the promise of immunity or leniency. Abstract:
November 13, 2013
Given the recently increased focus on criminal competition law matters (e.g., cartels) and whistleblowing, the latter in the competition law world and corporate crime area generally, I thought I would launch a new whistleblowing page on the blog. A kind of rolling compilation of Canadian competition law whistleblowing information. For my first go at a few key recent Canadian competition law whistleblowing sources see: whistleblowers or below. As usual for my competition law overviews, I’ve endeavoured to include a few quotes that I’ve come across and thought were really rather good, including Ralph Nadar’s inaugural definition of “whistleblower” from the 1970s.
October 3, 2013
Earlier today the Competition Bureau published for public consultation a new draft Inquiries Bulletin. Canada’s new Commissioner of Competition, John Pecman, also outlined some of the Bureau’s priorities and made new announcements in remarks delivered at the annual CBA Fall Competition Law Conference in Ottawa.
Templates/precedents and checklists to run promotional contests in Canada
Templates/precedents and checklists to comply with Canadian anti-spam law (CASL)
