Competition regime: CMA priorities and draft secondary legislation
Download the full outcome
Detail of outcome
The government published a consultation on a non-binding ministerial statement of strategic priorities (the steer) for the new Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), alongside a first tranche of detailed secondary legislation. This focused on high level priorities and provides a transparent statement of the government’s aspirations for the development of the competition regime. It asked the CMA to identify markets where enhanced competition can promote growth.
The initial government response summarises responses to the consultation and highlights the government’s decisions for the steer, after considering respondents’ views. It includes the steer in its final form. This document does not respond to the comments on the draft secondary legislation, as the second tranche of secondary legislation was still open for consultation when it was published.
A separate government response to the consultation on secondary legislation has also been published.
This consultation was followed by:
- a second consultation on CMA guidance
- a second BIS consultation on draft secondary legislation (a document that provides further draft statutory instruments)
- a consultation on the CMA’s vision, values and strategy
Feedback received
Detail of feedback received
The government received 18 formal responses to the consultation, 17 of which commented on the Steer.
Original consultation
Consultation description
The Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 (ERRA13) will create a single Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to succeed the Office of Fair Trading and the Competition Commission, and give it strengthened powers to promote competition and therefore growth. We are now consulting on a ministerial statement of strategic priorities for the CMA and secondary legislation which clarifies how the competition regime will work in future.
This consultation seeks views on the draft text of the steer and the following key pieces of secondary legislation:
- maximum penalties for failure to comply with the CMA’s information gathering powers
- legal rules to determine when an enterprise is to be treated as controlled by a person and the turnover of an enterprise for the administrative penalty for failure to comply with merger interim measures
- modification of the scheme dealing with public interest concerns in ‘European relevant merger situations’
- timing of merger fee payments
This document forms the first of 2 sets of consultations on draft statutory instruments. It runs in parallel with a consultation by the CMA Transition Team on some of the new CMA guidance, which explains the reforms to the legal framework and how the CMA will use its powers in practice. You may find it useful to consider both consultations together: Competition and Markets Authority guidance: part 1.
The 2 consultations will be followed by a second BIS consultation document that will provide further draft statutory instruments and a second consultation on the CMA’s guidance. These will be published in mid-September 2013.
Documents
Last updated 14 March 2014 + show all updates
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Additional government response to the draft secondary legislation published.
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Government response published.
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First published.