{"id":187030,"date":"2018-10-26T04:16:42","date_gmt":"2018-10-26T08:16:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=187030"},"modified":"2018-10-26T04:16:42","modified_gmt":"2018-10-26T08:16:42","slug":"supreme-court-refuses-hear-appeal-price-fixing-lawsuit-air-canada","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/10\/26\/supreme-court-refuses-hear-appeal-price-fixing-lawsuit-air-canada\/","title":{"rendered":"Supreme Court refuses to hear appeal in price fixing lawsuit against Air Canada"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u201cThis provision is an estimate based upon the status of investigations and proceedings at this time and Air Canada’s assessment as to the potential outcome for certain of them,\u201d the document states. (File Photo<\/a>: aircanada\/Instagram<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Supreme Court of\u00a0Canada\u00a0has cleared the way for a broader class-action lawsuit against Air\u00a0Canada\u00a0and British Airways by refusing to hear an appeal requested by\u00a0Canada’s largest airline in a decade-long price-fixing case.<\/p>\n

Air\u00a0Canada\u00a0had sought to overturn a 2017 Ontario Court of Appeal ruling that provincial courts could hear a class-action case that includes foreign claimants that purchased Air\u00a0Canada’s air freight services, rather than limiting it to mainly Canadian companies.<\/p>\n

Launched in 2008, the lawsuit from three companies alleges price fixing on international cargo shipments by major airlines between 2000 and 2006.<\/p>\n

Linda Visser, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, says they have reached settlements totalling more than $29 million with all 14 defendants except Air\u00a0Canada\u00a0and British Airways.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom an access to justice perspective it’s a significant decision, because there are few jurisdictions that actually have class-action regimes. And often these types of claims are not economical to bring on an individual basis,\u201d Visser said.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit involves up to tens of thousands of class members, many of them foreign exporters and freight forwarders that handle shipments ranging from flowers to fruit to zoo animals, she said.<\/p>\n

The plaintiffs are Ontario’s Airia Brands Inc., Britain’s StarTech.com Ltd. and Germany’s Quick Cargo Service.<\/p>\n

Air\u00a0Canada\u00a0declined to comment, saying the case is before the courts.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe case confirms that the Ontario courts are a place where foreign claimants from around the world can come and start class actions,\u201d said Ranjan Agarwal, a class-action defence lawyer at Bennett Jones.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s been going on a long time, and it could still go on a lot longer. But now that the defendants have lost their big fight over jurisdiction, and given that the case has been certified\u201d \u2014 greenlighted by a lower court judge \u2014 \u201cmost people would believe that this would lead to a settlement.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2012, Air\u00a0Canada\u00a0paid $8 million in a U.S. class-action settlement agreement following allegations of anti-competitive air freight pricing, though the company did not admit liability.<\/p>\n

In March 2017, the European Commission fined Air\u00a0Canada\u00a0$30 million \u2014 11 airlines were fined about $1.2 billion in total \u2014 for allegedly running a price-fixing cartel on cargo fuel and security surcharges between 1999 and 2006.<\/p>\n

An appeal to the General Court of the European Union is pending.<\/p>\n

Earlier investigations by the U.S. Department of Justice and\u00a0Canada’s Competition Bureau into alleged price fixing wrapped up without charges.<\/p>\n

As of Dec. 31, 2016, Air\u00a0Canada\u00a0had set aside $17 million \u201crelating to outstanding claims,\u201d according to a management document on the company’s finances.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis provision is an estimate based upon the status of investigations and proceedings at this time and Air\u00a0Canada’s assessment as to the potential outcome for certain of them,\u201d the document states.<\/p>\n

Of the defendants that have settled, Air France\u2014KLM and Deutsche Lufthansa AG paid the most, shelling out $6.5 million and $6.2 million respectively, according to Siskinds law firm, which represents the plaintiffs.<\/p>\n

Appeal Court Justice Sarah Pepall’s ruling from October of last year states Ontario courts have jurisdiction in the class action because there is a \u201csubstantial connection\u201d between the claims and the province and the \u201cabsent foreign claimants\u201d share \u201ccommon issues\u201d with the plaintiffs.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Supreme Court of\u00a0Canada\u00a0has cleared the way for a broader class-action lawsuit against Air\u00a0Canada\u00a0and British Airways by refusing to hear …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":187031,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-187030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","mauthors-christopher-reynolds","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187030\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}