General Scheme of the Competition Bill 2001

sceptre

This nearly slipped by... an article from today's Sunday Times written by Pat Massey, former director of cartel enforcement at the Competition Authority. Nothing to do with Eircom, but you can easily see how it would apply.

(from http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/pages/sti/2001/10/14/stibuibui01006.html)

The General Scheme of the Competition Bill 2001 was published by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment last July.

Mostly it deals with cartels - but there's also an idea on the dominance of a market by a monopoly (which may or may not make it into the final bill)

From the article:

Another proposal would give the authorities the power to break up a dominant firm. In the Microsoft case, the American district court originally ordered the break-up of the giant computer software company, although this was overturned on appeal. In the 1980s American courts ordered the dismemberment of AT&T, the telecoms giant.

The law would permit the authority to advise the government on the implications for competition of proposed legislation and to identify and comment on regulatory impediments to competition. In a whole host of areas statutory restrictions limit competition, as seen in the pubs, pharmacy and, until recently, taxi industries. This proposal has potentially far-reaching implications.

Now, I don't know how we do it, but I think we've got to impress on politicians that the anti-competitive monopoly provisions make it into the final Bill.

P R O F A N I T Y

one thing I noticed about this campaign is the lack of focus, we know what we want and when we want it but not how.
these laws could be a serious stepping stone towards our goals, and id fully support this. its important to keep momentum going, and as soon as the black out is finished we should step into this.