Gas cartel class action suit lawyers clash with Competition Bureau

Lawyers targeting gas retailers in a multimillion dollar class-action lawsuit are facing resistance in trying to obtain evidence from the Competition Bureau.

Since 2008, the Bureau has charged 39 people and 15 companies with criminal price-fixing in the EasternTownships, Victoriaville and Thetford Mines.

Thirty people and seven companies have pleaded guilty.

Another three people were convicted after going to trial.

Today in a Quebec City court, lawyers behind the class-action suit filed a motion to speak withthe Competition Bureaus principal investigator in the case and have access to the entire investigation, including 220,000 wiretap conversations.

Federal government lawyer Marie-ve Sirois-Vaillancourt said it would take more than 40 years and "cost between $5-6 million" for civil servants to sift through all the documents in order to besure they containno personal or sensitive information before handing them over.

"We are asking the government to take on research that will be relevant," saidSirois-Vaillancourt. "The government has other things to do.

She is arguing that no one has the right to go digging around the Competition Bureau offices and that its not the job of civil servants to supply evidence for a class-action lawsuit.

• Wiretaps allowed in gas price fixing lawsuit

It will be up to thejudge to decide whether or not to allow the plaintiffsaccess to the information they are requesting.

Plaintiffs in the two concurrent lawsuits allege 1.2 million customers might have paid too much for gas because they allege the price-fixing was taking place in another 26 cities and regions where the Competition Bureau never laid any charges.