Substantive reforms to the private enforcement provisions under Canada’s Competition Act (Act) took effect on June 20, 2025, and mark a significant loosening of the historical constraints on private access to the Competition Tribunal (Tribunal). These changes are expected to prompt an uptick in competition-related litigation in Canada.
The amended regime expands the range of conduct eligible for private challenge, lowers the threshold for obtaining leave to proceed before the Tribunal, and most notably, introduces a framework for monetary compensation for successful private applicants. For Canadian businesses and legal practitioners, the shift represents a meaningful increase in litigation risk and a strategic opening for potential applicants.
The landscape to date: Limited private access, no monetary relief
While private enforcement has long played a role in Canada’s competition law framework, its scope has been narrower and procedurally limited. Private parties have traditionally been able to bring damages claims before provincial superior courts or the Federal Court in response to alleged criminal offences under the Act, including cartel conduct such as price-fixing and bid-rigging. These claims have most often taken the form of class actions, though suits launched by competitors, particularly in the misleading advertising context, have also occurred. These civil claims regarding allegations of criminal conduct remain unaffected by the latest amendments.
Separately, and under a distinct mechanism, private parties have had access to the Tribunal to pursue civil reviewable matters with leave. This regime already applied to refusal to deal, price maintenance, exclusive dealing, tied selling, market restriction and abuse of dominance. The leave threshold required the applicant’s business to be “directly and substantially affected” by the conduct (with a lower “directly affected” standard for price maintenance cases). Available remedies were strictly behavioural in nature — prohibition and remedial orders — with the sole exception of abuse of dominance, which permits administrative monetary penalties (AMPs) as well, albeit payable only to the government.
What’s changed: Scope, threshold and remedies
Effective June 20, 2025, the private enforcement landscape has broadened across three major dimensions: the types of conduct subject to challenge, the criteria for leave and the availability of monetary relief.
Expanded conduct
First, private access to the Tribunal has expanded to cover two additional categories of civil reviewable conduct: anti-competitive agreements under section 90.1 of the Act and deceptive marketing practices under Part VII.1 of the Act. Significantly, section 90.1 agreements need not involve competitors, capturing a broader array of business-to-business arrangements, including customer/supplier contracts, that may substantially prevent or lessen competition.
The inclusion of deceptive marketing as a basis for private action marks an especially noteworthy development. Practices such as drip pricing, greenwashing and other forms of deceptive marketing, previously enforced exclusively by the Competition Bureau (Bureau) in the civil sphere, will now be open to direct challenge by private parties, subject to leave.
Lower leave thresholds
The amendments also relax the standard for obtaining leave to bring a private application. It will be sufficient that the applicant’s business is “directly and substantially affected in part” by the conduct in question, as opposed to requiring that the business as a whole meet that threshold. In the case of price maintenance, “directly affected” remains the test.
An alternate path to leave has also been introduced: the Tribunal may grant leave where it determines that doing so would be in the public interest. For claims, the public interest is the sole basis for leave.
Monetary compensation introduced
Perhaps the most consequential change is the introduction of monetary relief for successful private applicants. For non-deceptive marketing claims, the Tribunal will be able to order compensation up to the value of the benefit derived from the impugned conduct, to be distributed among the applicant and others affected.
In deceptive marketing cases, where the applicant establishes that representations were materially false or misleading, compensation may be awarded to purchasers of the product at issue up to the total amount paid. In both scenarios, monetary relief sits alongside the behavioural remedies, and in some cases, the availability of AMPs.
This is the first time that private parties have been eligible for financial compensation in civil competition cases under the Act, a development that will likely change the calculus for both applicants and defendants.
Bureau oversight and monitoring
Although the new regime empowers private actors, it maintains a role for the Bureau. If the Bureau has already commenced an application relating to the same facts, private parties are barred from initiating a parallel proceeding. Similarly, if the Bureau has an ongoing inquiry, or has concluded one through settlement, private applications on the same matter are not permitted.
An additional inflection point for Bureau intervention occurs where a private applicant has been granted leave but subsequently discontinues the application due to a settlement. In such cases, the parties must provide the settlement agreement to the Bureau, which retains authority to seek a variation or rescission of the settlement. This provision may create an incentive for parties to resolve matters before leave is granted, thereby avoiding mandatory disclosure and possible intervention.
Strategic considerations for businesses
The pending changes significantly heighten litigation exposure for businesses operating in Canada. Compliance programs should be reviewed and updated to reflect not only the broader scope of conduct now open to private challenge, but also the increasing range of remedies and lower threshold for Tribunal access.
More broadly, the amendments should prompt a rethinking of competition law risk assessment. Businesses that might previously have focused more on Bureau investigations or class action exposure now need to account for the heightened possibility of private applications before the Tribunal, including those brought by competitors, suppliers or customers.
There may also be a strategic upside. The revised regime makes it easier for businesses to initiate private proceedings where they are adversely affected by competitors’ conduct, without needing to rely on Bureau enforcement.
Looking ahead: Potential for class-like actions
While the Act’s private access regime does not establish a formal class action mechanism, the availability of monetary compensation to multiple affected persons has encouraged interest in pursuing collective actions. Plaintiff-side counsel may seek to test the boundaries of Tribunal procedure to bring such applications.
Should that trend materialize, the litigation risk associated with misleading advertising and anti-competitive conduct would expand beyond bilateral disputes to resemble the class proceedings already familiar in cartel cases.
The expansion of private enforcement under the Act marks a watershed moment for competition law in Canada. By curtailing the gatekeeping function of the Tribunal and offering private actors a financial stake in enforcement, the new regime is poised to generate a broader, more active field of litigation. For businesses and their counsel, the imperative is clear: anticipate the new risks, prepare for new tactics and not overlook the new opportunities that private access may provide.
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Randall Hofley is a Partner in the Blakes Competition, Antitrust & Foreign Investment group. A former General Counsel to Canada’s Competition Bureau, he has litigated many of Canada’s high-profile cases under the Competition Act and has extensive experience before courts, tribunals and regulators in contentious competition matters.
Jonathan Bitran is a Partner in the Blakes Competition, Antitrust & Foreign Investment group. His practice focuses on complex merger reviews, litigation and compliance under the Competition Act and Investment Canada Act, with additional expertise in communications law. He was seconded to Canada’s Competition Bureau.
Navin Joneja is Co-Chair of the Blakes Competition, Antitrust & Foreign Investment group. He advises on mergers, joint ventures, strategic alliances, cartels, abuse of dominance investigations, class actions and compliance programs, and is a recognized authority on Canada’s competition and national security regimes.
Joe McGrade is an Associate in the Blakes Competition, Antitrust & Foreign Investment group. His practice covers merger reviews, contested mergers, class actions, price fixing and cartel investigations, abuse of dominance, joint ventures and strategic alliance, and regulatory compliance.