Browse regulations

This Order applies subsection 58(1) of the Species at Risk Act to protect critical habitat of the Silver Shiner (Notropis photogenis), restricting activities that could damage or destroy this habitat as specified in the recovery strategy.

This regulation imposes property rights restrictions and compliance costs on landowners to protect a single fish species. It reduces economic liberty and land use flexibility without transparent cost-benefit justification. Market-based conservation incentives or voluntary stewardship programs would achieve species protection more efficiently while preserving prosperity and competitiveness. The unseen costs include foregone development, reduced property values, and economic distortions that ultimately harm the very communities the regulation claims to serve.

Fee remission order for medical device establishment license applications submitted between April 2020 and December 2021 that were subsequently cancelled by January 2022, waiving fees for applications where payment was not made before examination completion.

Time-limited order with eligibility criteria that expired in 2022; cannot be invoked today and serves no current purpose, contributing to regulatory clutter without providing any ongoing benefit.

Establishes an expungement process for convictions related to bawdy-house activities (non-prostitution) and pre-legalization abortion offences, with specific evidence criteria for each offence category.

Deleting this would perpetuate unjust barriers to employment, housing, and dignity for individuals convicted of victimless or now-decriminalized acts. The administrative burden is minimal compared to restoring liberty and property rights; a formal process prevents arbitrary denial and ensures consistent application.

The Online News Act regulations establish criteria for determining bargaining power imbalances between digital platforms and news businesses, set notification requirements, and define conditions for exemption orders that allow platforms to negotiate collective agreements with news organizations instead of individual deals. The regulations specify revenue thresholds, user base requirements, and detailed criteria for fair compensation, sustainability, journalistic independence, and equitable distribution of payments.

These regulations create artificial bargaining power imbalances by forcing large platforms to negotiate with news organizations, distorting market incentives and creating regulatory capture. The complex criteria for exemption orders add bureaucratic overhead while the underlying premise - that platforms 'owe' news organizations compensation for linking to their content - is economically unsound and contradicts property rights principles. This intervention reduces market efficiency, increases compliance costs, and ultimately harms both consumers and the media ecosystem.

Establishes a mandatory, expedited adjudication system for construction payment disputes, including proper invoice requirements, an Adjudicator Authority to certify and oversee adjudicators, eligibility criteria (10 years construction experience, no conflicts), procedures for appointment (joint selection or Authority appointment), evidence timelines, and strict determination deadlines (20 days). Aims to ensure timely payment through fast, specialized dispute resolution outside courts.

Deleting this regulation would return construction payment disputes to slow, expensive court litigation, devastating small contractors with cash flow crises and reducing industry competition. The regulated system achieves timely payment efficiently through a streamlined adjudication process that private contracts cannot reliably provide due to unequal bargaining power between large developers and small subcontractors. The Adjudicator Authority ensures impartiality and consistent expertise at low administrative cost, preventing widespread business failures and consumer price increases that would result from chronic payment delays.

Designates Ontario, Saskatchewan, and Alberta as provinces subject to the Federal Prompt Payment for Construction Work Act, with coming-into-force provisions linked to the Budget Implementation Act, 2019.

It expands federal regulatory reach into provincial jurisdiction, imposing compliance costs and restricting freedom of contract; existing legal frameworks already address payment disputes, making this duplicative and harmful to economic liberty.

Regulation sets criteria for provinces to be designated under the Federal Prompt Payment for Construction Work Act, requiring provincial laws to mandate invoice submission, payment timelines, non-payment notices, binding adjudication processes, and defines excluded days, interest calculation (Bank of Canada rate + 3%), and circumstances where adjudicators may decline to decide disputes.

This regulation imposes government-mandated payment terms and dispute resolution on private construction contracts, overriding freedom of contract. It arbitrarily sets interest penalties, creates bureaucratic adjudication systems, and distorts market incentives. The unseen costs include reduced contractual innovation, moral hazard, increased transaction costs, and a chilling effect on private solutions like bonding, insurance, and reputational mechanisms that naturally evolve in competitive markets. Federal involvement in provincial contractual matters violates subsidiarity principles.

The regulation mandates construction, equipment, and safety standards for Canadian commercial vessels (≥24 m) and foreign vessels in ice-covered internal waters, incorporating international conventions (SOLAS, MLC 2006, etc.) with Canadian modifications, and includes grandfathering, Ministerial approvals, and labor provisions.

Keeping this regulation imposes high compliance costs, creates barriers to entry, and reduces maritime competitiveness, harming Canadian consumers through elevated goods prices and limited shipping options. Its unseen consequence is the entrenchment of a bureaucratic apparatus that perpetuates prescriptive standards over market-driven safety innovations.

Procedural rules for the Copyright Board of Canada governing tariff approvals, objections, hearings, and party participation. They establish filing deadlines, service requirements, case management, evidence rules, confidentiality orders, and intervention rights to facilitate the Board's authority in setting mandatory royalty rates and levies that override voluntary licensing agreements.

This regulation sustains a compulsory licensing system that violates property rights by enabling a government board to override voluntary contracts. Direct costs include compliance burdens, translation requirements, and procedural complexity that increase legal expenses passed to consumers. Unseen effects distort market incentives, create barriers to alternative licensing models, and foster a permission-seeking culture that stifles entrepreneurial risk-taking. The framework contributes to brain drain by making Canada less attractive to skilled creators and businesses, and it entrenches the flawed premise that government can set optimal prices better than free negotiation.

Order directing CRTC to impose requirements on broadcasters (including foreign online services) to support Canadian content, Indigenous participation, and diversity among equity-seeking groups. It emphasizes outcome-based approaches, minimizes algorithmic disruption, exempts social media creators, and urges flexibility, reduced burden, and audience choice.

The regulation imposes mandatory requirements that distort market signals, increase costs passed to consumers, and create administrative burdens. It forces allocation of resources to content that may not align with consumer preferences, causing deadweight loss and reducing innovation. The central planning approach cannot overcome the knowledge problem, leading to compliance gaming rather than genuine audience value, while raising barriers to entry and stifling competition.

The regulation directs the CRTC to maintain a regulatory framework mandating wholesale access to telecommunications infrastructure at regulated rates to foster competition, affordability, consumer protection, and universal access, with extensive oversight, monitoring, and reporting requirements.

This regulation imposes forced access and price controls that distort market incentives, reduce infrastructure investment, and entrench regulatory capture. Wholesale mandates prevent natural market competition by making new entrants dependent on incumbents' networks rather than building independent infrastructure, while tariff setting eliminates price discovery. The extensive consumer protection provisions increase compliance costs passed to consumers, and universal access subsidies misallocate capital. Unseen effects include reduced network quality, delayed technological deployment, and an environment where regulators rather than consumers determine service offerings.

Comprehensive framework regulating retail payment activities in Canada, establishing risk management, incident response, safeguarding of funds, and reporting requirements for payment service providers

Creates massive compliance burden that disproportionately harms small fintechs and startups, while established players can absorb costs. Stifles innovation in payment systems and increases costs for consumers. The regulatory complexity creates barriers to entry that protect incumbents and reduce competition in the financial services sector.

This regulation applies subsection 58(1) of the Species at Risk Act to designate critical habitat for the Atlantic Mud-piddock (Barnea truncata), as identified in its recovery strategy, imposing protections on lands and waters essential to the species' survival.

This regulation restricts private property rights and productive economic use of designated lands/waters, imposing compliance costs, development constraints, and opportunity costs on Canadians. The benefits of preserving critical habitat for a single mollusk species are highly uncertain and diffuse, while the costs are concentrated and real—reduced housing supply, limited commercial activity, and constrained resource use that directly diminish prosperity and competitiveness.

Exempts specific navigable waters listed in a schedule from the approval requirements of section 23 of the Canadian Navigable Waters Act, reducing regulatory burden for developments affecting those waters. Comes into force upon publication in the Canada Gazette, Part II.

Deleting this exemption would re-impose unnecessary regulatory hurdles on development projects near these waters, increasing costs and delays without commensurate navigational protection benefits. The exemption targets waters where the navigation interest is less significant, efficiently allocating regulatory resources.

Defines documentary requirements to prove goods from beneficiary countries are 'directly shipped' to Canada, enabling eligibility for preferential tariffs. Requires through bill of lading or shipping route evidence; if transshipped through another country, customs control documents must show goods remained under customs control. Repeals obsolete Mexico-specific regulations.

Deletion would produce either fraudulent abuse of preferential tariffs or arbitrary official discretion. The regulation achieves its fraud-prevention goal with minimal burden by leveraging existing commercial and customs documents, providing legal certainty. Alternative approaches would be more invasive (physical inspections) or create unacceptable uncertainty that would deter legitimate trade and increase costs for importers and consumers.