The bread supplier that admitted to price-fixing earlier this year says in new court filings that any anti-competitive behaviour it participated in was at the direction and to the benefit of its then-majority owner Maple Leaf Foods – Dec 8, 2023Maple Leaf Foods asserted its innocence in an alleged bread price-fixing scheme ahead of a hearing to determine whether it will be added to an ongoing class-action lawsuit.
Canada Bread was fined $50 million by the Competition Bureau in 2023 after admitting to four counts of price-fixing, but has argued as part of the class-action lawsuit that Maple Leaf, which was its majority owner at the time, should shoulder the blame instead.
“We continue to believe that the pricing practices of Canada Bread were responsible, consistent with industry practice, and above all, lawful,” he said in a statement on the company’s website in August 2023. The bureau began investigating the alleged scheme in 2016 and has alleged at least $1.50 was added to the price of a loaf of bread over a period of 16 years.