When we launched Ontario Construction News in May 2019, we ended a very long-standing business monopoly of another organization in publishing Certificates of Substantial Perrformance (CSP) and other legal notices mandated by the Ontario Construction Act. 

Our new daily construction newspaper significantly lowered costs for CSP advertisers, and we set a new standard for delivery speed. Certificates submitted to us by 5:00 p.m. would be published in the next weekday's issue, with the Notice of Publication sent that day.

We designed Ontario Construction News to comply with two key pieces of legislation defining legal notices and publicaton for Ontario's Construction Industry. In addition to compliance with the Ontario Construction Act's definition of a "construction trade newspaper." we took care to comply with the Legisation Act (2006)'s highly specific definition of a "newspaper" for publishing legal notices.

“newspaper”, in a provision requiring publication, means a document that,

(a) is printed in sheet form, published at regular intervals of a week or less and circulated to the general public, and

(b) consists primarily of news of current events of general interest; (“journal”)

While the Legislation Act has a provision that allows for variances if other acts or regulations contradict it (namely Construction Act regulations allow the construction trade newspaper to be published in electronic format), we concluded that we should design our publication to be as close to the specified newspaper definition under the Legislation Act (2006) --, publishing in regular daily intervals, with "sheet form" pages (as a PDF). Of course Ontario Construction News isn't printed on paper, but it is technically possible for us to print-on-demand it as a conventional newspaper.

This satisfied the definition of "newspaper" referenced in the Ontario Construction Act's regulations, but we needed to go further, to ensure we met the specific definition of a "construction trade newspaper."

The Ontario Construction Act says a "construction trade newspaper" means a newspaper,

1. that is published either in paper format with circulation generally throughout Ontario or in electronic format in Ontario,
2. that is published at least daily on all days other than Saturdays and holidays,
3. which calls for tender on construction contracts are customarily published, and
4. that is primarily devoted to the publication of matters of concern to the construction industry

The original (and formerly monopoly) daily construction trade newspaper publisher, Daily Commercial News, has published a legal opinion that a website with a few news articles doesn't qualify as a "newspaper."  Conversly, Link2Build.ca asserts that it can follow a common law definition of an "electronic newspaper" and has published its legal opinions backing that argument.

Regardless, three organizations are now publishing CSP notices, and readers needing to research whether a notice has been published have a new problem -- they must visit multiple sites to figure out if the relevant notices have been published.

We have sought a solution to this problem -- and desiged this site to allow to simplify the research process, where you can quickly scan for publication details with a simple keyword search.

Please note this search tool is a convenience resource, not a legal site, and there can be errors, missed listings, and technical difficulties that result in it failing to capture details about published certificates, or possibly provide inaccurate information. Accordingly, for certanity, readers should individually search all three relvant sites to be sure. We provide a link to the relevant site(s) for each published certificate to help in the process.

When it comes time to publish your notices and certificates, we encourage you to consider the combination of price, convenience, reliability and compliance in making your choices. Ontario Construction News, owned by the company affiliated with this site, has set a fixed price significantly lower than the long-established construction daily newspaper, while taking the approach that we should comply as much as possible the Legislation Act (2006)'s definition of a "newspaper", except where the Ontario Construction Act uses language that is explicitly contradictory. This ensures your published CSP notice will stand the test of time -- and you'll save hundreds, even thousands of dollars on your notice publication requirements, while you can be confident you are compliant with the relevant legislation.

If you have any questions or comments about this site, please email us at insights@certificatesubstantialperformance.com