In this issue:
The OFT and Private Actions
The Office of Fair Trading and Private Antitrust Litigation
The UK Office of Fair Trading has issued a discussion paper on proposals to make redress for consumers and business for breaches of competition law more effective.
The OFT Discussion Paper – Private Actions In Competition Law: Effective Redress For Consumers And Businesses
As regulators and competition authorities are never tired to tell us, “A healthy competitive market place guarantees the best possible deal for European consumers and businesses alike.” The question is how to turn competition law and theory into an effective tool that will directly benefit consumers and businesses?
OFT Discussion Paper on Private Enforcement
As a competition litigator, I have a great interest in ensuring that this area of law develops since so much is still uncertain. What we need is a body of case law which will set out the parameters and procedures for resolution of private actions in the courts. But it is doubtful that the proposed proliferation of actions and tribunals will generate the clarity and focus which is required.
Antitrust and the Chicago School
Thoughts on the Chicago Legacy in U.S. Antitrust
In preparation for writing this paper, I re-read Robert Bork’s The Antitrust Paradox, and I thoroughly enjoyed doing so. Not because I agree with everything in it, though there is much with which to agree. And not only because I enjoy Judge Bork’s writing, though it is always a pleasure to see a sledgehammer used with such precision.
U.S. Circuit Courts and Bundled Rebates
Bundled Discounts and Cascade Health Solutions v. PeaceHealth
On March 20, 2007, a panel of the Ninth Circuit took the unusual step of issuing an open invitation for amicus curiae briefing on the liability rules governing bundled discounts.
