The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is launching a 10 year review of the concurrency arrangements, which set out how the CMA and the eight sector regulators - including Ofgem, Ofcom, and Ofwat - work together to enforce competition law and promote competition in the regulated sectors so that UK consumers can enjoy more competitive outcomes, such as lower prices and more choice in services they rely on.
In 2014, reforms were introduced to enhance the concurrency arrangements and strengthen cooperation between the CMA and sector regulators on their shared competition powers. Ten years on, the review is an opportunity to assess the impact of concurrency on the work of the regulators and competition in the UK.
Together the regulated sectors form a major part of the UK economy. For consumers, services such as energy, water and communications are essential and take up a large part of household budgets. At a time where many are facing rising living costs, competition is an important tool to help keep prices down and promote innovation and growth.
The CMA is calling for views and feedback on the impact and effectiveness of the concurrency arrangements from as diverse a range of perspectives as possible. The CMA wants to hear views on how the arrangements have helped the effectiveness of sector regulators, their impact on the effectiveness of the UK's competition regime and any improvements which could be made to the arrangements.
Anyone who wants to participate in the review is invited to submit a response to the CMA's call for inputs.
The CMA expects to report the findings of the review on the Concurrency Review case page in Spring 2024.
Notes:
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The concurrency arrangements were introduced in their current form by the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013. Some of the reforms are set out in accompanying secondary legislation (The Competition Act 1998 (Concurrency) Regulations 2014).
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In addition to these legislative reforms, a series of changes were made in 2014 to the cooperation arrangements between the CMA and the sector regulators.
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The concurrent competition powers shared between the sector regulators and the CMA are the powers to enforce the prohibitions in the Competition Act 1998, and the powers to conduct market studies under the Enterprise Act 2002, and if appropriate, make a market investigation references to the CMA.
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The sector regulators with concurrent competition law powers are the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA); the Office of Communications (Ofcom); the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA); the Northern Ireland Authority for Utility Regulation (NIAUR); the Gas and Electricity Markets Authority (Ofgem); the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR); the Office of Rail and Road (ORR); and the Water Services Regulation Authority (Ofwat).
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