Madam Chair, I'll admit that we initially proposed some clumsily worded amendments to clause 14 earlier in our meeting to try to allow the legislation to give the minister the power to override concerns about competition in the name of the public interest. Clearly, those amendments failed, so now we have in front of us the main clause as amended by Mr. Fraser.
I just want to make the point—and I know members opposite are going to vote in favour of clause 14 as amended, or at least I expect them to—that I really am opposed to clause 14.
I think this is a real step back for competition law in Canada. I remember the changes to the Competition Act in 2004 that were introduced by the government of then Prime Minister Paul Martin, which worked their way through a minority Parliament, whereby we strengthened competition law in Canada by introducing civil remedies for the bureau to go after people who would engage in anti-competitive behaviours. Those civil remedies were significant in administrative monetary penalties, making Canada once again a world leader in competition law.
We've traditionally been a leader in competition law. I understand from memory that sometimes it isn't perfect. We introduced competition law in this country before the United States did, in an era where there was monopolistic competition, and through the decades that competition law has been continually strengthened.
It was made clear to us in committee here by the bureau in, I think, testimony that was fairly direct that this law weakens competition, because it would allow the minister to ignore competition in the name of public interest, which is not very clearly defined—in other words, in the name of politics—to allow for joint ventures to take place without the kinds of conditions that the bureau would put on them.
I'll be the first to say, as a member of Parliament who represents a greater Toronto area riding, that I support a robust airline industry in this country. I think both Air Canada and WestJet are great carriers and I think they provide excellent service, but I also believe in competition. I've heard from constituents time and time again that they feel that flying here in Canada is more expensive than it is abroad, and while there are a variety of factors that play into that, such as airport landing fees and airport rents and other factors, such as fuel taxes and the like, it's also clear that increasing competition would also lead to lower fares.
This is not an insignificant issue. We're talking about an industry that has tens of billions of dollars a year in revenue. I think Air Canada's revenues are in the range of $13 billion to $14 billion a year, and WestJet's revenues are in the range of $4 billion or $5 billion a year, and the rest are smaller airlines. You're looking at an industry that accounts for 1% of GDP. To allow an airline to enter into a joint venture without the bureau being able to impose conditions on it would obviously be hugely advantageous to an airline like Air Canada but disadvantageous to competition and to Canadian consumers. Especially in light of the fact that the airlines have been reporting record profits, which I'm very happy to see, and in light of the fact that they've emerged out of the great recession intact, I think this is a real step backwards. I just want us to vote on this with our eyes wide open, because I think the government has taken a pretty big step in this bill by proposing an exemption to the act that would allow the minister, in the name of public interest, to override competition concerns.
I don't know if Mr. Disend, from the industry department—sorry, I forget the new name—has any comments on this, but that's my big concern about this bill.
A lot of this bill deals with sectors of the Canadian transportation system that are not subject to the kind of competition the airline industry is. We've spent a lot of time on the rail issue, precisely because we have monopolistic competition in the delivery of western Canadian farmers' grains and oilseeds products, and we have an industry in this bill, the airline industry, that went from being government-owned, quite inefficient, and not customer-oriented to an industry that is a robust industry 20 or 30 years after those big changes were introduced, the privatization of Air Canada and the quasi-privatization of our major airports. This industry is growing, providing employment, profitability, and much better customer service.
I'm concerned about this. I would be interested to hear what Mr. Disend has to say about this particular clause 14 of the bill, particularly in respect to this. If clause 14 had been in effect in 2011, and the minister of the day and the airlines of the day, Air Canada, had decided to appeal to the minister in the name of public interest, and the minister had agreed in the name of that public interest to override the concerns about competition and allow the Air Canada-United Airlines joint venture to go ahead without any conditions, would that have strengthened or weakened competition in Canada's airline industry?