The Conservative party has indicated that, if elected at the next general election, it intends to make several reforms that will dramatically affect the current competition regulatory landscape. Leader of the Conservative party David Cameron has said that, under a Conservative party, quasi non-governmental organisations (quangos) will have substantially less power.
In his 6 July 2009 speech, Mr Cameron singled out the Office of Communications (Ofcom) as his first victim, stating that:
‘Its remit will be restricted to its narrow technical and enforcement roles. It will no longer play a role in making policy. And the policy-making functions it has today will be transferred back fully to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.’
Ofcom has been quick to justify its existence, stating that it is ‘an independent regulator with clear statutory duties, including the promotion of competition in the interests of the UK public’ and that, in his attack, Mr Cameron appears to have forgotten that Ofcom was ‘itself a product of regulatory rationalisation – merging five regulators into one’.
The communications minister, Lord Carter, has described the attack on Ofcom as being ‘somewhere between superficial and ill-informed’, stating that quangos are needed because ‘in certain areas… we need either professional expertise or independence from government’. Many would argue that the specialist area of competition regulation is indeed one area where such professional expertise is required.
The Conservatives are also planning several reforms in the banking sector and, if elected, will review the competition implications of the Lloyds/HBOS merger.
Final two articles by Warsha Kalé, associate director, and Angela Gregson, trainee, Berwin Leighton Paisner LLP.E-mail: warsha.kale@blplaw.com;angela.gregson@blplaw.com.
