News
Canadian retailer fights bike import tax
Canadian Tire, one of Canada's biggest retailers of bicycles, has filed a request for judicial review to overturn thee Canadian International Trade Tribunal's recommendation that the Canadian government impose punitive taxes on imported bicycles
Most Canadian IBDs and big box bicycle retailers are opposed to CITT's recommendations, a ruling which found in favour of complaints filed by companies including Procycle and Raleigh Canada.
The government has yet to decide whether to accept CITT's recommendations. The government risk upsetting China, which is responsible for nearly half of Canada's bicycle imports.
The CITT recommended that the government should enact emergency protection measures to shelter domestic bike makers from what it has concluded has been a sharp and sudden influx of offshore imports, causing serious injury, said a report in the Globe and Mail.
Canadian Tire questions how the CITT could find "serious injury" in the "face of extensive evidence of positive financial indicators for the domestic industry as a whole."
The company blames not China but "poor strategic business decisions made by the domestic industry" for the rise in imports.
The recommended tax would hit mass-market bikes that currently retail for about $400 or less.
