Thank you for the question.
It is important to say a couple of things on the subject. One is that the minister, quite rightly, pointed to the fact that a comprehensive competition reform looks at effects and judges on the basis of effects, rather than just stating that...there is no right prohibition on a particular kind of aspect. This is because they are often use case-specific. The goal of the Competition Act is not to be a price regulator in every single market vertical, but instead to ensure that there are effective restraints on behaviour, and where those behaviours significantly lessen competition, we have the tools to be able to act.
Between the actions of Bill C-56 and what was announced in the fall economic statement, there's a pretty comprehensive approach to try to make sure that we have actually targeted and provided the right tools for those effects that are particularly noxious to competition, whether that's abuse of confidence, whether that's a merger that potentially rules things out, whether that's the betrayal of inputs that are fundamental to the competition or whether that's competition that will harm the labour market. All of those kinds of functions are built into the changes that are proposed.
An outright prohibition that simply suggests something is prima facie anti-competitive is often best left to vertical regulators that are versed in the specifics of that use case, rather than trying to do it through a lot of general application, which can then apply on the basis of effects.