Melanie Aitken now heads one of Ottawa's most powerful regulators, the Competition Bureau. Parliament has handed her a broad array of new powers to crack down on businesses that harm competition.
Unlike predecessors who tended to leave merger work to staff, Ms. Aitken said: "I can't do my job that well unless I engage and am accessible."
"She has repeatedly stated that she wants to bring more cases and she may get her wish," says Omar Wakil. Because the bureau has more powers to impose penalties – as much as C$15-million to C$25-million for abuses such as price fixing, false advertising and abusive dominance – "the business community may be less inclined to settle cases and more inclined to fight," says Omar.
The full article is available to subscribers here.