The Regulations Repealing Certain Regulations Made Under the Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006 (Miscellaneous Program), registered as SOR/2026-69, eliminate three obsolete regulatory instruments under the Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006. These include the Conditions for Exempt Persons Regulations, the Payments to the Provinces Regulations, and the American Consumption of Softwood Lumber Products Regulations. The repeal is made by the Governor in Council on the recommendation of the Minister of National Revenue and the Minister for International Trade. It comes into force on the date of registration. The measure is part of a broader regulatory cleanup initiative intended to remove spent instruments from Canada’s federal regulatory inventory and ensure that statutory requirements remain current, relevant, and enforceable.

The regulatory context arises from the historical framework of the Softwood Lumber Agreement between Canada and the United States, known as the 2006 Softwood Lumber Agreement (2006 SLA), which governed export charges and volume restraints on Canadian softwood lumber shipments to the United States. The agreement entered into force in 2006, was extended in 2013, and ultimately expired in October 2015. It included a standstill provision that temporarily prevented the United States from launching new trade actions for a limited period after expiry, which ended in 2016. Following the expiration, the United States initiated anti-dumping and countervailing duty investigations in 2016, leading to the imposition of duties beginning in 2017, that continue to affect trade relations. Disputes have since been pursued through international mechanisms, including the World Trade Organization (WTO), the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and its successor the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA).

The objective of the Repealing Regulations is to formally remove three outdated regulatory instruments that no longer have legal or practical effect due to the expiry of the underlying trade framework. By repealing these regulations, the Government of Canada ensures coherence within the federal regulatory system, reduces unnecessary complexity, and eliminates potential ambiguity regarding the application of export charge and volume restraint mechanisms that are no longer in force. The repeal also aligns with the Cabinet Directive on Regulation, which requires departments to maintain a regulatory stock that is efficient, relevant, and periodically reviewed for obsolescence. Although exporters of softwood lumber must still comply with export permitting requirements under the Export and Import Permits Act and associated regulations, they are no longer subject to export charges or quotas linked to the defunct agreement.

This regulatory amendment results from coordinated reviews conducted by the Canada Revenue Agency and Global Affairs Canada aimed at identifying obsolete or spent statutory instruments within the federal regulatory stock. The analysis determined that the three regulations repealed under SOR/2026-69 have no current operational effect, as the export charge and volume restraint mechanisms associated with Softwood Lumber Export Charge Act 2006 are no longer in use.

Canada (69/2026) May 12, 2026
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