Proper, transparent and just prioritization policy as a challenge for national competition authorities and prioritization of the Slovak NCA

• Authors: Ondrej Blažo

Abstracts

FR

L’article cherche à définir certaines limites du cadre de la politique de priorisation afin de montrer que les ANC sont liées par certains principes pour établir leurs politiques de priorisation et ne sont pas complètement indépendantes ou autonomes. Dans ce contexte, la définition des priorités par l’ANC slovaque, la surveillance de ce processus et l’évaluation de sa crédibilité sont analysées. Le pouvoir de hiérarchiser les affaires fait partie de la stratégie d’indépendance fixée par la directive ECN+ et est lié à l’utilisation efficace de ressources. Bien que la hiérarchisation fasse partie des éléments de l’indépendance des ANC, la directive ECN+ ne prévoit pas d’autres conditions pour la politique de prioritarisation des ANC. Les décisions concernant la hiérarchisation des mesures d’application peuvent permettre à une ANC de se concentrer sur les infractions les plus graves au droit de la concurrence. D’autre part, elles peuvent être critiquées en raison de leur manque de transparence, de leur caractère arbitraire, de leur disproportionnalité et de l’inégalité de traitement. Par conséquent, la politique de hiérarchisation des priorités doit être intégrée dans le cadre garantissant une application correcte et une procédure régulière de la loi. Le cadre juridique de la Commission européenne concernant le rejet des affaires ainsi que le contrôle judiciaire limité peut inspirer les ANC. Bien que les ANC ne soient pas limitées dans le choix de leurs priorités, certaines infractions à la concurrence doivent inévitablement être incluses dans leurs priorités, comme les ententes et les truquages d’offres. Le cas de la Slovaquie montre un niveau relativement faible de responsabilité de l’Office antimonopole de la République slovaque devant le Parlement, et le contrôle judiciaire et parlementaire de la définition des priorités et de la selection des affaires de l’Office est limité. L’article conclut que dans le cadre de la réforme de l’ANC slovaque, il ne suffira pas de garantir l’indépendance de l’AMO, y comprise la fixation des priorités, mais qu’il faudra faire progresser les mécanismes de responsabilité et de contrôle.

EN

The paper tries to establish some limits of the framework for prioritization policy in order to show that the NCAs are still bound by certain principles for setting their prioritization policies and are not completely independent or autonomous. In this context, priority setting by the Slovak NCA, surveillance of this process and evaluation of its credibility is analysed. The power to prioritize cases became a part of the ‘independence toolkit’ of the ECN+ Directive and is linked to effective use of limited resources. Despite including prioritization into the elements of independence of NCAs, the ECN+ Directive gives no further requirements for the prioritisation of the performance of enforcement powers of NCAs. Decisions regarding prioritization of enforcement can allow a NCA to focus on the most serious infringements of competition law. On the other hand, they can be challenged due to lack of transparency, arbitrariness, disproportionality and because of unequal treatment. Hence the prioritization policy, as well as individual decisions, shall be embedded into the framework safeguarding proper enforcement and due process of law. The legal framework of the European Commission for the system of rejection of cases as well as limited judicial review can serve as an inspiration for NCAs. Although NCAs are not restricted in the selection of their priorities, some competition infringements shall be inevitably included in their priorities, such as cartels and bid rigging. The case of Slovakia and its NCA shows a relatively low level of accountability of the Antimonopoly Office of the Slovak Republic (AMO) to the parliament, and judicial as well as parliamentary control of the prioritization and case selection of the AMO is limited.The paper concludes that within the reform of the Slovak NCA, it will be insufficient to only grant the AMO guarantees of independence, including independence of priority setting, and that mechanisms of accountability and review shall be evolved.

Keywords

EN

Competition law; EU law; Slovakia; prioritization; parliamentary; surveillance; rejection of complaints; credibility of NCA; accountability of NCA

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Warszawski. Wydział Nauk Ekonomicznych
• Journal: Yearbook of Antitrust and Regulatory Studies
• Year: 2020
• Volume: 13
• Issue: 22
• Pages: 117-144

Dates

published

2020

Contributors

author

Ondrej Blažo

• Comenius University in Bratislava, Faculty of Law
• Institute of European Law

• https://orcid.org/0000000197218724

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Identifiers

DOI

10.7172/1689-9024.YARS.2020.13.22.5

Biblioteka Nauki

2159035