Paperweight Award

CFIB’s Paperweight Award (i.e., the award no one wants to win) highlights the most ridiculous examples of red tape from across the country that cause frustration and headache for Canadian citizens and business owners. In 2026, the Paperweight Award goes to the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) for a new importing system (CARM) that has caused significant challenges for small firms. CFIB also recognizes a few other harmful policies by awarding two honourable mentions.

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WORST OF THE WORST

Stifling, not simplifying trade: CBSA Assessment and Revenue Management (CARM)

Recipient: Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA)

The CBSA Assessment and Revenue Management (CARM) system was supposed to simplify how businesses pay duties and taxes. Instead, since its launch in October 2024, it’s become a frustrating and confusing system for many small businesses. At a time of growing trade tensions with the U.S., the last thing small importers needed was more red tape. Yet CARM delivered exactly that: a confusing, time-consuming portal that disrupted day-to-day operations and added new costs.

Over a year after its launch, many small firms are still struggling just to register. The onboarding process is buried in paperwork, from requirements around tracking import numbers to answering detailed shipping questions. To make matters worse, as of May 2025, the Release Prior to Payment (RPP) program, which was built with big businesses in mind, became mandatory for all businesses to have their goods released at the border. As one transportation company in Alberta put it:

“As a small importer of ATV, snowmobile, motorcycle, and marine parts, our orders have typically been about $1,000/month, but once a year we will have a big order of approximately $55,000, which means we have to pay $12,000 a year for a surety bond/cash to be tied up. It seems to make no sense.”

CFIB’s April 2025 data found that only 37% of small firms had been enrolled in the RPP program . The requirement to either post a cash deposit or bond has proven unworkable for businesses with limited cash flow, making trade more expensive and complex. For some, the only remaining option is to physically go to the border to have their shipments cleared—a completely impractical solution for busy entrepreneurs trying to keep their businesses afloat.

Compounding the problem are system outages, ongoing technical issues, and frequent billing errors, combined with short billing cycles that strain cash flow. Support delays further exacerbate these issues, leaving small businesses to contend with these challenges on their own.

A major contributor to the chaos has been the transition process. CARM was rolled out without sufficient time for businesses to adapt just as tariffs were being introduced, making a complex process even more confusing. By contrast, the Canada Revenue Agency’s My Business Account (MyBA) took several years before becoming mandatory, allowing the Agency to refine the system, educate users, and work through operational challenges. CBSA should have taken a similar phased approach, especially given the scope, timing, and sensitivity of CARM.

The fix: CBSA should simplify the onboarding process, exempt small and medium-sized businesses from RPP security requirements, and fix technical glitches. Additionally, CBSA should consider waiving CARM-related penalties and prioritize education and responsiveness during the system’s early years to allow businesses to adapt without undue stress.

2026 Paperweight Honourees

Quebec’s Bill 29: “You’ll need another warehouse”

Recipient: Government of Quebec

As of October 2025, Quebec retailers now must guarantee access to spare parts, repair services, and maintenance information for every product they sell with more than one component. If this cannot be guaranteed, they must provide a written waiver for each item sold. Manufacturers must also supply similar documentation.

For each product sold online, retailers must provide a link leading to the manufacturer’s information on where consumers can access spare parts, repair services, and maintenance information. These requirements are nearly impossible to implement, especially for small businesses who are often the last link in the supply chain, due to the sheer volume of products and lack of access to technical data. Quebec businesses, especially SMEs, rely heavily on suppliers from outside the province, limiting their control over repairs and access to parts.

Despite calls for clearer rules and realistic timelines by many organizations, including CFIB, Quebec’s government has not made any adjustments to the program. The law also imposes severe penalties, up to $3,500 per day in administrative fees and $175,000 in criminal fines. Even a few days of administrative penalties could disrupt a small business enough for it to close.

The fix: CFIB collaborated with the Fédération des chambres de commerce du Québec (FCCQ) on a submission to the Quebec government (French only) which advocated for an approach that favoured incentives over punitive measures. The approach also recommended avoiding adding regulatory, administrative, and financial burden on businesses, supporting the competitiveness of local manufacturers and retailers against foreign firms, and prioritizing local purchasing in the circular economy.

CFIB recommends exempting microenterprises and small retailers from the obligation to repair products for free and requiring consumers to contact the manufacturers directly to have their legal warranty of proper functioning honoured.

Warmth needs a permit (apparently): Metro Vancouver’s fireplace registry

Recipient: Metro Vancouver Regional District (MVRD)

Metro Vancouver residents were feeling the heat in 2025, as they were forced to register their fireplaces or face up to $500 in fines. This measure adds red tape for residents across the region, with little evidence it will achieve Metro Vancouver’s stated goal of cleaner air. Instead of incentivizing upgrades to modern, efficient appliances, Metro Vancouver chose a punitive approach that creates confusion, stress, and unnecessary paperwork for over 100,000 households.

Once registered, Metro Vancouver only permits residents to operate in compliance with the Residential Indoor Wood Burning Emission Regulation Bylaw. Where applicable, registrants are required to know and enter the fireplace make, model, and emission rate (in grams per hour), and upload supporting documentation.

As of September 15, 2025, residents with traditional “open” wood-burning fireplaces were banned from using wood and now may only use manufactured fire logs. To burn regular wood, residents must pay out of pocket to upgrade to an emissions-certified fireplace.

Other restrictions include what paper can be used to start a fire, the size and temperature of the fire, and specific rules for maintaining the fire for overnight heating. Although registration is free, those found in non-compliance with either the registry or bylaws can face up to $500 in fines.

The MVRD’s fireplace registry is just the latest example of local governments attempting to “leapfrog” provincial standards. The province can, and should, ensure a single standard for environmental policies to avoid municipal patchworks that hurt businesses and confuse taxpayers.

The fix: Instead of leaving taxpayers out in the cold, Metro Vancouver should be sparking a positive conversation about how best to incentivize upgrades to newer, modern fireplace equipment. Current incentive programs, such as the MVRD’s Community Wood Smoke Reduction Program, are complicated and cannot accommodate the large number of homeowners affected. The province of British Columbia should further ensure a single, common set of regulations when it comes to its climate policies.

The Worst of the Worst for 2025 is Red Tape Rollback: A step backwards for Manitoba's small businesses
Recipient: Manitoba Government

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WORST OF THE WORST

Red Tape Rollback: A step backwards for Manitoba’s small businesses

Recipient: Manitoba Government

Bill 16 has left Manitoba’s small business community reeling. The Bill repeals the Regulatory Accountability Act and effectively dismantles the province’s hard-won regulatory accountability framework, eliminating two key mechanisms that shielded them from regulatory overload: the ongoing count of regulatory requirements, and the critical one-for-one rule.

Over the past six years, the province made significant progress in cataloging and creating an inventory of its regulatory requirements, an enormous task that took considerable effort from the public service. A baseline count was established to track the number of regulatory requirements, providing a clear picture of the regulatory burden across departments and fostering trust and transparency with Manitobans. Bill 16 tosses aside regulatory accountability by eliminating the requirement to count new rules and regulations. Maintaining the count would have required minimal additional effort, as the framework has been in place since 2017 with all ministries already tracking their regulatory counts.

Manitoba’s one-for-one rule ensured that for every new regulation introduced, an outdated or unnecessary one was removed. Without this safeguard, new regulations could start piling up, creating layers of unnecessary red tape. CFIB’s survey of Manitoba business owners following Bill 16’s introduction revealed overwhelming disapproval:

96% of small business owners believe that regulatory accountability is essential for an open and transparent government.
93% believe the provincial government should make red tape reduction a top priority.

Eliminating these accountability measures threatens to exacerbate the regulatory burden on Manitoba’s small businesses, posing a significant concern for many entrepreneurs.

The fix: The Manitoba Government should reinstate the one-for-one rule and maintain the ongoing count of regulatory requirements. By doing so, it would protect small businesses from regulatory creep and ensure the government’s commitment to cutting red tape remains intact.

2025 Paperweight Honourees

The GST/HST grinch: How the holiday tax break stole small business’ cheer

Recipient: Federal Government of Canada

The federal government’s temporary GST/HST holiday, designed to boost retail sales, has instead caused administrative chaos, unexpected costs, and widespread confusion for small businesses.

Announced just before Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday—the busiest retail period of the year—the tax holiday left businesses scrambling to implement system changes with just two weeks’ notice. So far, the average business has spent a median of one full eight-hour work-day implementing the GST/HST tax break changes.

Reprogramming point-of-sale (POS) systems during the holiday season is not only time-consuming but costly, with a median estimated expense of $1,000. Adding to the burden, 66% of small businesses struggled to navigate a confusing, inconsistent, and arbitrary list of tax-exempt items, leaving many uncertain about how to apply the exemptions accurately. Toy and hobby store owners had to make judgement calls on things like adult versus child LEGO, while gift stores had to account for every item in gift baskets during their busiest times of year.

Instead of driving economic growth, businesses believe the tax holiday merely shifted consumer spending patterns to capitalize on the tax-free period, with two-thirds of small businesses anticipating delayed purchases or returns. Concurrently, 65% believe large corporations and online giants will reap far greater benefits than small businesses. By the halfway point of the tax holiday, only 5% of businesses reported an increase in sales.

Manufacturers and distributors, often unaware of their need to also adjust for the GST/HST holiday, compounded the administrative challenges for small businesses. The rushed rollout, unclear guidelines, and high costs have left many entrepreneurs feeling unsupported and frustrated.

Short-term fixes like the GST/HST holiday disproportionately impact small businesses, saddling them with unnecessary red tape and costs. To truly support Canada’s entrepreneurs, the government must focus on long-term policies that promote stability and growth instead of creating temporary, burdensome measures.

The fix: Provide affected businesses with a $1,000 credit in their GST/HST accounts to offset programming and administrative costs. Direct the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) to waive taxes owed, penalties, and interest for good faith errors made during the rushed implementation period. Focus on meaningful, permanent tax changes, such as reversing the planned 19% increase in the carbon tax.

License to play: Les Cedres’ playground bureaucracy

Recipient: Municipality of Les Cedres

Children in Les Cedres, Quebec, are free to play in the neighbourhood streets as long as the municipal government has approved their paperwork. A 2023 by-law aimed at promoting safe ‘free-play’ among children and youths has taken an unusual approach to achieving its goal by mandating children to fill out and submit paperwork to the city.

The by-law requires the bright young minds of Les Cedres to first navigate an obstacle course of municipal red tape, before they are allowed to scale imaginary mountains in their neigbourhood streets. Every summer, children must fill out a form, indicate what street they would like to play on, obtain signatures from two-thirds of the adult residents living on the relevant street, and then submit their form to the recreation director, or risk getting fined up to $1,000.

However, the red tape nightmare does not end there. Upon receipt of the form, the recreation director must submit it to the municipal council for final approval. Once approved, the street will be deemed a free-play zone where children are allowed to play, but only between the hours of 9 am to 8 pm.

While CFIB acknowledges the need to establish safety procedures to ensure that children can play safely in the neighbourhood streets, there are alternative ways to achieve that without burdening young people with paperwork.

The fix: The municipality of Les Cedres should eliminate the application process and strategize on more effective ways to achieve street safety.

A price tag on transparency: Winnipeg’s $28 tax search

Recipient: The City of Winnipeg

Accessing basic tax information has become a headache for businesses in Winnipeg. Unlike many other municipalities that provide property tax data online for free, the City of Winnipeg offers no easily accessible information. When businesses attempt to research their tax assessments and obligations, they are forced to jump through hoops just to find out how much they owe or where they stand.

Upon contacting the city's tax department, businesses are directed to an outdated and ineffective tax search portal. To make matters worse, accessing any information comes with a minimum fee of $28 per search—just for the privilege of knowing their own tax data. This pay-to-access system feels more like a toll gate than a service, creating unnecessary costs for businesses, especially small ones trying to manage tight budgets.

This is a prime example of the kind of red tape that wastes time and resources, erodes trust, and reduces transparency, adding to the frustrations of businesses simply trying to comply with their rising tax obligations.

The fix: The city should remove the fee for residents and businesses to retrieve their tax data, fix the registration link for the page, and explore options to make this information more easily findable and accessible.

The dog days are over: Toronto's new rules for commercial dog walkers

Recipient: Toronto City Council

A group of commercial dog walkers in Toronto have been handed on a leash of bureaucracy thanks to a recent decision by city council banning them from Ramsden Park’s off-leash area. This change came after a few residents complained about noise and parking- common features of life in a busy, high-density urban neighborhood.

The city had previously allowed these dog walkers to use the park freely, but this all changed in June 2024 when the council, decided to clamp down. Now, these small business owners, who are simply trying to walk dogs in their own neighbourhood, are suddenly facing the prospect of driving across town to find another park—assuming they can even find one with the same amenities. The ban, which took effect in September 2024 without any consultation from commercial dog walkers, has sparked a petition calling for designated hours (11 a.m.–3 p.m.) rather than an outright prohibition.

The council’s decision does not just impact the livelihood of the dog walkers, it creates unnecessary hurdles for the entire community. Instead of working towards a compromise, like setting specific hours or having designated areas, the city has imposed a blanket ban that threatens these small businesses’ survival. In a city that claims to support local entrepreneurs, this decision feels like an unnecessary, anti-entrepreneurial, and heavy-handed approach to what could have been a manageable problem.

The fix: The city should reverse the ban and implement fair, clear guidelines, such as allowing commercial dog walkers during specific hours while also ensuring their involvement in future consultations.

The Power of a Paperweight Award

When we stand together against unfair rules and regulations, we can have a major impact on government policies--like in Quebec, where a 2019 Paperweight Award helped this business owner wake up from his red tape nightmare.

Weekly steak dinners. A new business license—just for changing addresses. A carbon tax rebate costing $80,000.

These are just some of the regulatory blunders CFIB members have faced over the years. We’re taking a break from handing out these dubious honours in 2021 and 2022, but you can still see who has earned the spotlight in past years below.

DisService Canada - 2023 'Winner'

Government of Canada

January 31, 2023

«Unacceptable». That is how Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described Service Canada’s public service delivery over the past year. Ask the average Canadian, and they’ll probably add in a few more expletives. As the world was finally coming back to life after two years, someone clearly forgot to tell Service Canada.

In the summer of 2022 it became alarmingly common to see Service Canada locations sporting the kinds of lineups that are usually reserved for the latest iPhone or Taylor Swift tickets. Camping chairs and sleeping bags dotted city sidewalks as citizens camped out in front of passport offices in the hopes of making it to the front of the line by the next morning. More than 1.5 million Canadians applied for, or attempted to renew, their passport over the past year. According to an Angus Reid poll, 10% of applicants spent over six hours in line or over the phone. An astounding 5% reported paying someone to stand in line for them along the way!

Even after getting through, applicants on average waited 68 days to finally get their passport. Well beyond Service Canada’s pre-pandemic 10-20 business day service standard. All told, 80% of applicants experienced some form of inconvenience or frustration along the way. One in five wound up withdrawing their application entirely.

Paperweights Through The Years

2025

The 2025 Paperweight “winner” was the Manitoba Government for its Bill 16, which dismantled years of regulatory accountability by scrapping the regulatory count and the one‑for‑one rule—key safeguards against red tape creep. Other 2025 Paperweight honourees included the federal government’s GST/HST holiday, which created widespread administrative chaos for small businesses, and a Les Cèdres, Quebec bylaw requiring children to complete annual paperwork and secure neighbour signatures just to play on their street.

2024

Our 2024 paperweight award winners and nominees brought more red tape headaches for small businesses. Costume shops got hit with surprise duties after the CBSA reclassified their imports, Health Canada piled on costly new rules for natural health products, and Finance Canada buried payroll services in paperwork by removing a key exemption. Read more here.

2023

Service Canada took home the 2023 “DisService” award after epic passport delays left Canadians camping out in long lines like it was a Taylor Swift concert. In 2022, over 1.5 million applied, facing an average 68-day wait instead of the pre-pandemic 10-20 days. With 80% experiencing frustration and 20% giving up, even Prime Minister Trudeau called it “unacceptable.”

2021 - 2022

Weekly steak dinners. A new business license—just for changing addresses. A carbon tax rebate costing $80,000.

2020

Weekly steak dinners. An $80,000 carbon tax rebate. A new business license just for changing adddresses and a law that makes it difficult for doctors to give urgent medical assistance in a neighbouring province or territory experiencing a shortage. These were among 2020's horrific Paperweight Award winners.

But who won your 2020 Business Owners' Choice Award?

The government of British Columbia's Employer Health Tax (EHT) forces business owners to pay quarterly installments based on estimates of their payroll. The calculation is unlike B.C.'s other provincial payroll tax—worker's compensation—which is charged on actual payroll rather than guesswork. If a business owner is found to have underestimated their annual payroll, they must pay the difference plus interest.

This blunder was more than enough to secure the B.C. government 2020's Business Owners' Choice Award: Fortune Teller Finances.

2019

Guidelines on what condiments are acceptable for workers. Confusing, contradictory laws on cannabis labels. License applications straight out of the 1970s. These are just some of the regulatory nightmares that won our 2019 Paperweight Awards.

The Business Owners’ Choice of the worst red tape was the federal government’s web of confusion. Business owners have told us over and over again that it’s painfully hard to find information on Canada.ca and other government websites. If you CAN find the right info, it’s next to impossible to understand.

2018

In 2018, business owners were invited to have their say on the worst of the worst. The Business Owners’ Choice, winning by several hundred votes, was Finance Minister Bill Morneau, for adding more complexity and uncertainty to the tax code by imposing a subjective ‘reasonableness test’ on business owners who share income with family members. Other Paperweights "celebrated" Ontario's drastic labour overhaul, a sidewalk to nowhere in B.C., and Statistics Canada's compulsory, time-consuming surveys.

2017

2017 was another banner year for inane regulations. In addition to lemonade stand police and sidewalks to nowhere, we also saw Nova Scotia employers being required to do convoluted math to pay employees for partial shifts, Alberta agri-businesses forced to comply with employment standards that don’t recognize the realities of working on a farm, and P.E.I. residents being hit with extra taxes when selling property if the buyer is someone from another province.

2016

Halifax wins for its new patio regulations, which cost local bars and restaurants north of $1,000 to comply with. It shared the award with the Canadian Border Services Agency, for dropping its digital small business section; and the Ontario Recycling Authority, for a complicated digital form for reporting on packaging and recycling paper.

Runners-up included Revenu Québec for issuing a permit that construction companies had to give to clients… who then send it back to Revenu Québec. Also nominated were the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, the Canadian Border Services Agency (twice!), Port Metro Vancouver, the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources and the Saskatchewan Ministry of Labour Relations.

2015

The top honour went to Plateau-Mont-Royal, for requiring businesses to replace any plastic chairs used on their patios—a costly upgrade. The Ontario Ministry of Labour shared the award for mandating that employment standards information be printed on legal-size paper.

The also-rans: Manitoba Finance Minister Greg Dewar, for costing some businesses $30,000 because of a lack of guidance; the mayor of Rosemont-La Petite-Patrie, for banning new drive-thrus; and the mayor of Sherbrooke, Que., for banning certain types of marketing banners.

2014

The Temporary Foreign Worker Program, for becoming even more time-consuming and confusing, wins the Paperweight Award. Sharing the distinction: Multi-Material British Columbia, which required business to weigh, measure and report paper and packaging waste.

Dishonorable mentions went to the Saskatchewan Ministry of Labour Relations, for making it mandatory to get a permit to swap statutory holidays for other days off work; the Ontario Ministry of Labour, for mandating that directors, owners and independent contractors in construction buy workers’ compensation coverage; and the Quebec Ministry of Labour for continuing to outlaw cutting hair on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday in the Outaouais region.