Queen’s Park passes legislation on ticket sales
Critics call move largely symbolic because of tricky offshore bot companies
Ontarians may soon be able to get tickets to that must-see concert or sports event thanks to new legislation passed at Queen’s Park. The province on Wednesday banned the use or sale of ticket bots — computer software that quickly scoops up huge numbers of tickets online — and also put a ceiling on what can be charged for resale.
MPPs from the Liberals voted in favour of the bill, while the Progressive Conservatives and the New Democrats opposed it.
“This really puts fans first,” Attorney General Yasir Naqvi said.
“There’s no one magic bullet to dealing with the issue.”
NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said the legislation — the Liberals’ third attempt at tackling the issue — does not go far enough.
“They’ve had three kicks at the can and they’re still not addressing the jacking up of prices for families,” Horwath said. “The bottom line is this is not really consumer protection. It’s not going as far as it should.”
Progressive Conservative MPP Vic Fedeli (Nipissing) predicted the law would do little to combat bots.
“There was good legislation at the beginning that had full disclosure of the amount of tickets that were available and at the last second, the government themselves put an amendment that took that out,” Fedeli said.
That was a reference to a provision that would have forced ticket sellers to publicize how many tickets would be on sale for the concert, show or sporting event, as well as the capacity of the venue.
Naqvi said that was changed to avoid “unintended consequences” in smaller communities.
“Because that number is not a static number — of general on-sale (tickets). Because no artist likes to perform in an empty venue, that number fluctuates,” he said.
“By ensuring that we provided that number, it would have significantly impacted artists to go into smaller markets because they don’t want to perform in those types of circumstances.”
Critics have suggested the measures are largely symbolic because offshore ticket bot operators are difficult to track down and prosecute.
The issue erupted last year after the farewell Tragically Hip concert in their hometown of Kingston sold out within minutes.