Following the Board of Commerce case (in which the Privy Council determined that two Acts were ultra vires federal jurisdiction), the Parliament of Canada passed the Combines Investigation Act, 1923,[2] which provided for: The Criminal Code was also amended by inserting s. 498, which created a corresponding offence of combining to limit facilities, restrain commerce, or lessen manufacture or competition.

The following reference questions were posed to the Supreme Court of Canada: The Supreme Court unanimously held that both measures were intra vires federal jurisdiction, by virtue of the federal criminal law power.

As to Lord Haldane's restrictive interpretation that had been previously enunciated in the Board of Commerce case, Newcombe J said: I am convinced that he never intended to suggest that Parliament might not competently find a public wrong lurking or tolerated under the head of civil rights in a province which it is necessary or expedient, according to its will and discretion, or, using Sir Matthew Hale’s expression, “by the prudence of law-givers,” to suppress, in the exercise of its authority over the criminal law.

Instead, Atkin offered a new definition: Criminal law connotes only the quality of such acts or omissions as are prohibited under appropriate penal provisions by authority of the state.

Atkin's definition of what criminal law is has had a lasting impact throughout Commonwealth jurisprudence.