Earlier today, the World Trade Organization announced the entry of Vanuatu and Russia into the WTO. From the WTO:
“’Both accessions show that joining the WTO remains high on the countries’ agendas since trade can bring a predictable and stable basis for economic growth. This is especially important as the world goes through troubled times and continues to suffer from one of the worst global economic crisis in memory. Joining the WTO is a sign of confidence in the organization and in what it can deliver for its members’, said WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy.
From the date of accession, the Russian Federation has committed to fully apply all WTO provisions, with recourse to very few transitional periods. On average, the Russian Federation will apply a final bound tariff for 7.8% for goods and has made specific commitments on 11 services sectors.
Vanuatu committed that, from the date of accession, it will fully apply all WTO provisions and did not require recourse to any transitional period except on intellectual property and on the publication of trade information. Vanuatu will apply an average final bound rate of 39.7% and has made specific commitments on 10 services sectors. The services sector has been growing and now accounts for three-quarters of Vanuatu’s GDP.”
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has announced that a Puerto Rican pharmacy cooperative has settled price-fixing charges in relation to allegations that pharmacy owners, through a cooperative, had negotiated, entered into and implemented agreements among its member pharmacies to fix the prices on which they contracted with insurers and pharmacy benefit managers.
In making the announcement, the FTC said that the pharmacy cooperative’s actions over the past five years had led to higher prices for Puerto Rico’s health care consumers, and that the cooperative consisted of approximately 300 pharmacy-owner members owning more than 350 pharmacies in Puerto Rico (about one-third of Puerto Rico pharmacies).
Key issues raised by the FTC included collective negotiations by the pharmacy cooperative with more than 10 payers over reimbursement rates, execution of seven “master contracts” on behalf of member pharmacies and threats of collective refusals to supply by cooperative members to achieve higher negotiated rates for the supplying pharmacies.
The proposed consent order in this case includes terms to prohibit the cooperative from entering into or facilitating agreements between or among pharmacies to: (i) negotiate on behalf of any pharmacy with any payer, (ii) refuse to deal or threaten to refuse to deal with any payer, (iii) include any term, condition or requirement upon which any pharmacy deals, or is willing to deal, with any payer, including price terms and (iv) not to deal individually with any payer (or not to deal with any payer) other than through the pharmacy cooperative.
This recent association case caught my eye given that there have been a number of Canadian joint negotiation cartel cases involving associations.
The Federal Government has announced a series of cross-country consultations with industry and business leaders in relation to Canada’s global commerce strategy – including from SMEs – as part of its 2012 Economic Action Plan. From DFAIT:
“As part of Economic Action Plan 2012, the Government of Canada made a commitment to refresh the Global Commerce Strategy (GCS). The government is undertaking a series of cross-country consultations with industry and business leaders—including those from small-and medium-sized enterprises. A refreshed GCS will align Canada’s trade and investment objectives in large, dynamic and fast-growing priority markets, with an eye to ensuring that Canada is branded to its greatest advantage in those markets.”
The Government’s cross-country consultations will include Halifax, Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Calgary, Vancouver and Ottawa.
For more information see: Cross-Country Global Commerce Strategy Consultations.
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The American Antitrust Institute (aai) has published a new working paper entitled “Antitrust Compliance: An Annotated Bibliography”. Abstract:
“The purpose of this annotated bibliography is to survey the literature on antitrust compliance. The bibliography is organized into five sections: (1) current U.S. antitrust enforcement policy vis-à-vis compliance; (2) tools companies and in-house counsel can use to bolster existing compliance programs; (3) compliance in a globalized world; (4) recommended policy considerations; and (5) comparative policy considerations. Included are articles, commentaries, conference papers, essays, and books addressing one or more of the main categories into which the bibliography is organized.”
For a copy of the paper see: aai – Anitrust Compliance: An Annotated Bibliography.
From the Canadian Council of Chief Executives (CCCE):
“On September 24-25, 2012, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives will host “Canada in the Pacific Century”, a conference bringing together leaders from business, government, academia, and other key groups to discuss Asia’s rise and the implications for Canada.”
For the updated Agenda see:
“Emerging technologies, new platforms and evolving digital tools are changing the way audiences consume media, connect with brands and ultimately make purchase decisions. With the rise of smartphones, tablets and social media, today’s empowered consumers are seeking out information, interacting with brands and sharing their experiences. The old path-to-purchase model worked well with traditional media and brick-and-mortar stores: it was linear and predictable, starting with an ad and ending with an in-store purchase. But today’s digital path-to-purchase is non-linear and dynamic, with multiple touch points and interactions: consumers are doing everything from downloading product reviews while they’re shopping, to holding up their smartphones on a street to see where the best restaurants are. It’s a seismic shift that is reshaping the marketing and media landscape.
The 2012 Digital Day Conference, presented by Marketing magazine and the Canadian Marketing Association, will explore how best to navigate this fast-changing world and reach audiences at key points along the new purchase-decision journey. The focus will be on real-world examples, creative solutions and inspiring next steps in social media, mobile, online video, gaming, e-commerce, content creation and more.
Join us for a full day of keynote presentations, workshops and panel discussions featuring media, advertising and marketing leaders from across Canada and around the globe.”
In a curious twist in the growing dispute between the Alberta and British Columbia governments, stakeholders and individuals on either side of the environmental debate, with some political seesawing by the Federal Government thrown in, a British Columbia resident has recently alleged that Enbridge promotional videos for the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline were misleading.
According to media reports, the Vancouver Island resident filed a misleading advertising complaint with the Competition Bureau alleging that Enbridge promotional videos for its proposed Northern Gateway pipeline project omitted more than 1,000 square kilometers of islands along the proposed Northern Gateway tanker route (see e.g.: BC woman files complaint against Enbridge for misleading promotional videos). According to the complainant, Enbridge allegedly “distorted the maps in its promotional videos to erase numerous islands and twisting passages so that [the] tanker route appears much safer than it is”.
To some, it won’t be intuitively obvious why the Competition Act should apply, if true, to omissions of some BC terrain from videos for a pipeline – after all, Enbridge is not selling pipelines or tanker routes to Canadians.
The Competition Act does, however, cast a fairly wide net in terms of what may be false or misleading and a wide variety of claims have been challenged over the years under the “general misleading advertising” provisions of the Act, which prohibit not only false or misleading claims to market products (i.e., goods or services) but also “any business interest”.
In this regard, in one recent high-profile case, Commissioner of Competition v. Yellow Page Marketing, the Ontario Superior Court both reiterated that the Competition Act applies to false or misleading claims made to promote business interests and also that the phrase “business interest” should be liberally interpreted:
“Similar misrepresentations appear in the respondents’ domain names, invoices, reminder notices and letters sent by the respondents. Although the respondents argue that collection efforts after the contract had been completed were not to increase sales, the relevant provision of the Competition Act refers to promoting ‘any business interest’ and not just sales. The phrase ‘business interest’ must be given a wide meaning and collecting money, and threats made in relation to collection efforts, constitute promotion of the respondents’ business interests.”
One of the most colorful, if somewhat older, cases in which the misleading advertising provisions of the Act were invoked to challenge claims in relation to business interests was the Bre-X case. Plaintiffs in Bre-X claimed that that the publication of resource calculations, other data, reports and studies relating to Bre-X Mineral’s Indonesian mining assets breached the criminal misleading advertising provisions of the Competition Act, thereby giving rise to a civil cause of action.
The C.D. Howe Institute is hosting a roundtable in Toronto on November 16th with Simon Kennedy, Director of Investments (Industry Canada):
“Simon Kennedy is the Senior Associate Deputy Minister of Industry Canada, a position to which he was appointed in September 1, 2010. In this role, he works closely with the Deputy Minister to manage this federal government department, overseeing policies and programs of importance to Canada’s national competitiveness. One of his key roles at Industry Canada is Director of Investments under the Investment Canada Act, making him responsible for the administration of Canada’s foreign investment review process.
In February 2011, Mr. Kennedy was named by the Prime Minister as his representative to the bi-national Canada-U.S. Beyond the Border Working Group, which developed the Action Plan for Perimeter Security and Economic Competitiveness released by the Prime Minister and the President of the United States on December 7, 2011. Mr. Kennedy led the negotiation of the Action Plan with White House counterparts and the cross-Canada consultations with stakeholders. He resumed full time his duties at Industry Canada following the release of the Action Plan.”
Templates/precedents and checklists to run promotional contests in Canada
Templates/precedents and checklists to comply with Canadian anti-spam law (CASL)
