trade

Written by Simon Harms and Lisa Navarro

On 15 March 2012, the UK’s Department for Business Innovation and Skills (“BIS”) announced its plans for the reform of the UK competition regime. These proposals were crystallised on 23 May 2012 in the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill (the “Bill”).

The proposals set out in the Bill include amendments to the existing legal rules and certain procedures, as well as a major structural shakeup of the enforcement institutions, the Office of Fair Trading (“OFT”) and the Competition Commission (“CC”). As part of a wider rationalisation of UK governmental organisations, the OFT and CC are to be merged into a single entity, the Competition and Markets Authority (“CMA”) by April 2014.

This article highlights the main institutional and operational changes that will accompany this structural shift. It goes on to consider other key proposals contained in the Bill relating to merger control and the criminal “cartel offence”.
Continue Reading Reform of the UK competition regime

Written by Simon Harms and Stephen C. Tupper

Introduction

On 22 September 2011 the Office of Fair Trading (the “OFT”) published a market study on the state of competition in the organic waste sector in England and Wales (the “Market Study”) which was instigated at the request of the Water Services Regulation Authority (“Ofwat”) in the context of its ongoing comprehensive review of how it regulates the water industry.

Scope and findings

The Market Study covers the treatment of all types of organic waste which the OFT categorises into two broad types: sewage sludge (“SS”) which falls within Ofwat’s regulatory ambit; and other organic waste (“OOW”) such as slurries, manure and food and drink waste, the treatment of which is not directly regulated by Ofwat. The OFT examined the markets for the treatment of organic waste from three distinct angles: