•David

Per 5 October media release from the Ontario Ministry of Government and Consumer Services, regulatory changes to the Protection for Ontario Consumers Act impacting the travel and tourism industries will:

"Further protect consumers buying travel services by enabling the creation of new rules for representations, such as advertising by out of province travel businesses that target Ontarians, creating new registration requirements for individual travel salespersons and improving compliance with the rules by enhancing enforcement tools, such as administrative penalties."

I find those ideas scary.

"Out of province" travel businesses targeting Ontario consumers includes every American, European, etc. travel business having a Web site or running online ads that can be accessed from Ontario.

"Registration requirements for individual travel salespersons" - if taken at face value - could affect operators and agents everywhere by requiring them to register with the government of Ontario.

And from the Canadian government, here's a definition of "administrative penalties":

"Administrative penalties are a mechanism for enforcing compliance with regulatory legislation. They are monetary penalties assessed and imposed by a regulator without recourse to a court or independent administrative tribunal."

Are Canada regulators taking lessons from the EU?