Tausi Insider

The efficiencies defence is often erroneously cited as an impediment to robust enforcement of competition laws in Canada. Handout Michael Kilby is partner and head of the competition and foreign investment law group at Stikeman Elliott LLP. Lawson Hunter is senior counsel at Stikeman Elliott LLP and former head of the Competition Bureau. In recent months, public discussion of Canada’s competition laws has reached an all-time high. That is a good thing, given the importance of the subject to the Canadian economy. Much of the public discussion has, however, assumed facts not in evidence. And the more often and loudly certain things are said, the more obvious and indisputable they seem to become – often to the detriment of sound policy making. This is particularly true in the case of Canada’s “efficiencies defence,” under which a merger with anti-competitive effects may be allowed to proceed if those anti-competitive effects would be outweighed by economic efficiency gains. The efficien...