Can the government impose conditions on a business while an Investment Canada Act national security review is still underway?

The condition binds the business before there's a decision

Section 25.3(1.1) reads: “The Minister shall, by order, impose interim conditions in respect of the investment that are applicable until no later than when consideration of the investment is complete, or amend such conditions, if the Minister … is satisfied that it is necessary for the purpose of preventing injury to national security that could arise during that review, provided that the imposition of interim conditions does not introduce significant new risks of injury to national security.” A change to how a target handles client data, for example, can be ordered while the review that will decide the deal itself is still open.

It isn't a regulation, and it isn't optional

Section 25.3(1.2) removes the usual regulatory process: “The Statutory Instruments Act does not apply in respect of an order made under this section.” And enforcement does not wait for the review to conclude either — s.39(1)(d.2) gives the Minister a direct demand power tied to a s.25.3 order, independent of the review's eventual outcome.

The review itself ends only one of three ways

Section 25.3(6) gives the Minister exactly three outcomes at the end of the prescribed period: refer the investment to the Governor in Council with findings and recommendations, if satisfied it would be injurious to national security or unable to determine the question on the information available; send a notice that consideration is complete, if satisfied the investment would not be injurious; or send that same notice where satisfaction of no injury rests on undertakings given to the Crown. Interim conditions imposed under s.25.3(1.1) stay in force through all of this — they do not lapse merely because the review has reached one stage or another, only when consideration of the investment is actually complete.

Where this plays out in the Case Files

• • A national security review, six weeks in and still undecided, where the Minister ordered a data-handling change that bound the business immediately

Sources

• • Investment Canada Act s.25.3(1.1)/(1.2) — the interim-conditions power added 2024, c. 4, s. 15, and the exemption from the Statutory Instruments Act. Fetched and confirmed against the marginal note “Interim conditions.”
• • Investment Canada Act s.25.2 — the Minister's power to send the initial national-security notice that starts the review.
• • Investment Canada Act s.25.3(6) — the three possible conclusions of a national security review: referral to the Governor in Council, or a notice that consideration is complete.
• • No Treadstone Law page addresses Investment Canada Act national-security interim conditions. Treadstone Law's published coverage is general Ontario business and corporate law and does not reach this federal mechanism, so none of its pages is cited here rather than force an adjacent link that does not genuinely cover the topic.