February 13, 2014
Mark Warner over at Maaw Law has given a very good and reasoned interview earlier today on the competition and trade aspects of the Canadian federal government’s proposal to take steps to equalize prices between the U.S. and Canada for Canadian consumers. I thought this interview set out quite well the various competing issues in this new federal initiative (though I myself remain a bit skeptical regarding the workability of the proposal, and remained concerned about potential deterrence to foreign investment in Canada and whether this is in essence price regulation). For this quite good interview see: Canadian Budget 2014: What’s In It For Consumers.
February 11, 2014
Davies Ward Phillips & Vineberg have issued a new note on a bit of a competition law bombshell included in Canada’s federal budget earlier today (Proposed Amendment to Canada’s Competition Act to Prohibit “Unjustified” Cross-Border Price Discrimination) – a plan to legislatively address perceived cross-border price discrimination being faced by Canadian consumers (reprinted with permission).
February 10, 2014
In a curious bit of competitive beer market rivalry, The Beer Store and the Ontario Convenience Stores Association were issuing dueling news releases earlier today about the debated deregulation of liquor retailing in Ontario. Today’s beer competition duel, it seems, began with The Beer Store issuing a (Beer Store commissioned) report arguing that more competition in beer retailing in Ontario would lead to higher prices. Something of a head scratcher for a competition lawyer such as myself, given that more competition generally leads to lower prices.
February 7, 2014
Anti-corruption laws, particularly in Canada, have been receiving heightened attention from enforcers and commentators over the past several years. While Canada has officially had legislation prohibiting corruption of foreign public officials for some years (the Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act), as a practical matter the legislation was not much enforced and apparently little attention was paid to the legislation until several recent high-profile cases including the investigation of SNC-Lavalin (which has included criminal charges laid against two former SNC-Lavalin executives – see: here). In this regard, this new practical overview of Canada’s anti-corruption legislation authored by Davies Ward Phillips & Vineberg caught my eye.
February 7, 2014
The Canadian Chamber has published a new report on Canadian competitiveness, entitled: “Tackling the Top 10 Barriers to Competitiveness 2014”.
February 4, 2014
In an interesting and important development, Canada’s Federal Court of Appeal yesterday sent the Competition Bureau’s (the “Bureau”) abuse of dominance challenge against Canada’s largest real estate board back to the Competition Tribunal (the “Tribunal”) for redetermination. This case is in many ways the first decided essential facilities case in Canada under the Competition Act (the “Act”), though remains to be decided on its facts when it returns to the Tribunal.
January 29, 2014
Jarod Bona over at The Antitrust Attorney Blog has written a very good new note on competition law compliance and real estate services, and in particular some commonsense steps that real estate salespeople can take to avoid competition law risk. Given that many of the points discussed, including the importance of independently setting commissions, determining where to work (and for whom), the submission of bids (e.g., in the real estate foreclosure auction context) and dealing with competitors, apply equally in Canada, I thought I would reprint his note here (with permission).
January 29, 2014
The National Competition Law Section of the Canadian Bar Association has issued a call for papers for this year’s James H. Bocking Memorial Award. This annual award is presented for the best scholarly paper by a full time student or young lawyer (within the first three years of call) submitted to the Competition Law Section on a topic relating to Canadian competition law and policy.
Templates/precedents and checklists to run promotional contests in Canada
Templates/precedents and checklists to comply with Canadian anti-spam law (CASL)
