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ARTICLE · 24 MARCH 2009

Competition Act Amendments: Merger Review Will Take Longer And Cost More

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In an unprecedented move, the Federal Government has included as part of its 2009 Budget Implementation Act (Bill C-10) a radical overhaul of the Competition Act and a number of important amendments to the Investment Canada Act.

CanadaAntitrust/Competition Law
Neil Campbell
Neil Campbell
Éric Vallières
Éric Vallières
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In an unprecedented move, the Federal Government has included as part of its 2009 Budget Implementation Act (Bill C-10) a radical overhaul of the Competition Act and a number of important amendments to the Investment Canada Act. Budget bills are enacted quickly and with few revisions. A new era in Canadian competition law is on the horizon.

This McMillan Bulletin discusses the proposed amendments relating to Mergers and their implications for business. The proposed amendments relating to Advertising and Marketing, Competitor Agreements and Pricing Practices are dealt with in separate Bulletins.

Bill C-10 does not amend the substantive merger provisions of the Competition Act or alter the remedies for anti-competitive mergers. However, the Bill proposes to discard two decades of successful merger review practice in favour of harmonizing the Canadian regime with the US merger review regime, a process that is widely viewed as imposing excessive burdens on merging

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