Finance committee  Two different sets of views on the legislation? We very carefully have considered all of the complaints we have heard. No one has I think read them more attentively—

Finance committee  I would suggest, sir, the one thing that could help is the fact that we're not the first country to go through this process—

Finance committee  —and we feel we have a very strong analytical basis to the decisions that were made. Of the 93 countries, for example, on the declaration of use form, the only other countries that have it are the Philippines and the United States. The United States legitimately had a constitutional issue that required them to keep the form.

Finance committee  Yes.

Finance committee  Respectfully, sir, going through the analytical process ourselves that is the conclusion. It all leads back to the decision to eliminate that paper burden on firms.

Finance committee  Yes, sir.

Finance committee  Just trademark lawyers.

Finance committee  —we're the ninety-third, and we have looked carefully at the other jurisdictions. For example, one of the arguments is that opposition rates will go up in Canada. We've looked at jurisdictions and that hasn't happened. The idea that there are trademark trolls just waiting to descend on Canada....

Finance committee  Absolutely. If I could echo what you said, “use” has not been removed at all from the trademarks system. It's absolutely not the case that we're removing the concept of use. The intent to use—

Finance committee  We're reinforcing the concept of use, absolutely. We're eliminating a paper burden. It's a form that is not used by the Canadian Intellectual Property Office. It's also not used by the courts if there is a dispute over whether a trademark is actually being used on the marketplace.

Industry committee  There's not an expectation that there is actually going to be an increase in challenges. That has happened in a couple of countries around the world, in particular in the European Union, and in the European Union there isn't an examination process by which a lot of the weeding out of the poor quality trademarks happens.

Industry committee  I'm saying there's no.... We've talked to intellectual property offices around the world as we looked at how countries were implementing it, and there has not been a dramatic increase in the type of trolling behaviour focused on trademarks that some of the people who testified are claiming will happen in Canada.

Industry committee  I'll just note that this bill does not actually eliminate the concept of use. It eliminates the administrative requirement that trademark applicants have to include in their paperwork a statement indicating that they have used their trademark in Canada. So use is still in the system.

Industry committee  There were a couple of points that came up during discussion that we saved to the end. Are you okay if we just answer them? We'll do it between the two of us. One of the issues raised was whether or not the legislation was unconstitutional. I'd just like to put on the record that it's not unconstitutional.

Industry committee  Yes, that's the motivation.