Competition Law in England

Although competition law has occupied a place in the body of English law for many centuries, modern statutory competition policy first emerged in the aftermath of the Second World War. From the point of view of present laws, the statutes then introduced lacked the ability to deal with the prevalent market situations and had a faulty enforcement mechanism. The competition regime in UK got a major push only after the passing of the Competition Act 1998 and the Enterprise Act 2000. The doctrine of restraint of trade has played a major role in harmonizing freedom of trade and freedom to contract. The first statute to be brought into force was the Monopolies and Restrictive Practices (Inquiry and Control) Act in the year 1948. The passing of Restrictive Trade Practices Act 1956 resulted in a two-fold system comprising of restrictive activities and monopolistic activities. As time passed new acts were incorporated to fulfill the challenges posed by the market. The basic objective behind the passing of Competition Act 1998 was to shape the domestic law along the lines of EC law. This was done by introducing provisions, which dealt with, prohibition of anti competitive agreements and abuse of dominant position.

Section 2 of the 1998 Act is similar to Article 81(1) of EC law. Section 3 excludes certain types of agreement – such as mergers, which come under the ambit of the Fair Trading Act 1973. Section 50 provides for the ad hoc exclusion of land agreements and vertical agreements. Section 4 provides for the granting by the Office of Fair Trading of ‘individual exemptions’ from the prohibition where conditions set out in section 9 are satisfied by the agreements in question.

Section 18 of the 1998 Act incorporates Chapter II i.e. prohi...

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...Supreme Court and the ECJ to decide matters on predatory pricing. Prima facie, the section has been divided into two parts and so both the parts/conditions need to be fulfilled, and therefore, only when the goods are priced below the cost with an intention of driving out the competitors, it can be said to be illegal and termed predatory pricing. as per the Competition Act, 2002 even dominant position in itself is not an abuse or a restrictive trade practice. This is also position under Section 2 of the Sherman Act, 1860 and under Art 82 of the EC Competition Law. In MCX Stock Exchange Ltd v. National Stock Exchange of India Ltd., DotEx International Ltd. and Omnesys Technologies Pvt. Ltd, the CCI defined predatory pricing as the conduct, “where a dominant undertaking incurs losses or foregoes profits in the short term, with the aim of foreclosing its competitors.”