Thank you, Mr. Chair.
This amendment, as I indicated earlier.... My concerns with the Investment Canada Act are drawn from two concerns: national security, and the concerns of the national competition law section of the Canadian Bar Association. This amendment is in line with recommendations that were received by the committee on May 17 from that group of the CBA.
The bottom line is that the way the act is currently drafted creates an unintended consequence, and I will quote from the CBA:
The playing field in a competitive bid scenario would be tilted against private sector investors and in favour of SOE investors.
That's because of what I believe is a drafting mistake. When you get down on page 68, to “subsection 1.1”, they don't carry through enterprise value. We're dealing with only asset value, calculated in a manner prescribed. As a result, you could have an SOE that had an asset book value below the threshold level, but an enterprise level that might have been $1 billion. As a result, in a competitive bid, I think the drafting has accidentally given an SOE a potential advantage over a private sector investor.
That's what my amendment tries to repair.