Brussels, 05/11/2015 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 4 November, the European Commission announced that it was to open a public consultation on giving additional powers to the national competition authorities.
Regulation 1/2003, which entered into force in 2004, gives the national competition authorities and national courts a key role in applying EU rules on restrictive practices of businesses and abuses of dominant positions. However, it makes no provision for the resources and instruments with which the competition authorities apply EU rules on anti-competitive practices.
In its 2014 communication on the 10th anniversary of the implementation of this regulation, the Commission identified several areas for action to increase the powers of the national competition authorities and to level out the differences between the national systems. Since then, it has held discussions with these national authorities and with the ministries of the states.
With its public consultation, it is looking to find out how it can improve the situation in order to: - ensure that all of the national authorities have adequate tools to identify and sanction violations of the EU competition rules and that they have effective clemency programmes to encourage businesses to supply proof of the existence of cartels; - guarantee the independence of the national authorities and ensure that they have the resources and personnel they need. The Commission is also hoping to remedy the problems which certain authorities may encounter, related to their investigative powers or their authority to hand down effective fines in the event of anti-competitive behaviour. The public consultation will run until 12 February 2016. (Original version in French by Elodie Lamer)