moved that the bill be read the third time and passed.
Madam Speaker, first, I want to thank the member on the other side who brought to the attention of the House the fact that Sunday will be Mother's Day.
I want to wish a happy Mother's Day to all my constituents and to all Canadian women who will be celebrating that important day.
I am pleased to rise to speak at third reading of Bill C-249; it has been a few years. It deals with a substantive, important change to the Competition Act. I would like to thank the industry committee, including its chair, the member for St. Catharines, as well as my colleague the vice-chair, representing the Alliance, and members of all other parties for their work in making this such an important milestone as far as private members' bills are concerned.
The bill has as its origins the need to ensure that the loophole created in 1986, which in effect allows anti-competitive activity, not occur unless factors other than efficiency are considered. The case that was before the House dealt with Superior Propane and that issue saw a potentially damaging merger take place. The reality is that the language of the act was in dire need of change as a result.
I am pleased that Bill C-249 as amended has the support of the competition commission, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and a substantial number of consumer groups across the country.
As the competition commissioner said at committee on March 31:
The bill seeks to ensure that consumers are not left out of the equation when considering mergers involving efficiency claims. It would also safeguard competition to the benefit of consumers and the [Canadian] economy.
I want to point out that nowhere else in the world is there an efficiencies defence that is used to promote a potentially damaging merger that would see consumers and the competitive process harmed, not in the United States, not in Europe, not in Australia, nowhere around the world. Other competitive processes always try to at least balance the interests of consumers and the interests of those who are trying to create certain types of innovations and efficiencies.
Unfortunately, the act was left wide open for interpretation. It is correct and appropriate, as the committee quite rightly pointed out rather substantially, not only for this Parliament, that the issue be fully addressed. The commissioner also suggested that the act in itself is an important public knowledge document that allows consumers to certainly be aware of the fact that any quantifiable efficiencies would be treated appropriately.
Former Federal Trade Commission chair Robert Pitofsky pointed this out on the question of efficiencies:
My view is that the acceptance and clarification of the role of efficiencies in defense of mergers has been, on balance, a useful development in the United States. If there are no significant efficiencies, enforcement agencies and judges can be much more comfortable finding that particular mergers are anti-competitive--
His concern, which I think speaks very much to the concern we have here in Canada, was that benefits can only happen if they are likely to be passed on to consumers and efficiencies cannot be achieved in a substantially less anti-competitive way.
More important, I believe that the position taken for some years by groups and organizations that have tremendous concern with this precedent and with the wording of the act agrees that efficiencies in terms of merger review should not be stand-alone, that in fact they should be compared to all other factors. The amendment prescribed by the industry committee is appropriate and correct and I believe that Parliament must pass this bill. More important, I am pleased to have the support of my government as well as the Competition Bureau on this matter.