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The UK Government and the European Union have announced that they have formally concluded their technical discussions regarding the UK-EU Competition Cooperation Agreement, paving the way for the agreement to be ratified by the UK and EU Parliament in due course.
The agreement was originally envisaged as a necessary supplementary agreement to the EU-UK Trade Cooperation Agreement (TCA) and follows an EU Council Decision in June 2023 authorising the EU Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, to open negotiations with the UK.
This is the first competition co-operation agreement enabling the National Competition Authorities of EU member states to co-operate with a third country.
The future competition cooperation agreement will allow the EU Commission, the national competition authorities responsible for enforcing EU competition law in the EU Member States, and the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to cooperate directly in their competition investigations.
This agreement aims to ensure antitrust and merger investigations are communicated between the jurisdictions involved and, where necessary, set out agreed-upon principles of joint approach and cooperation to avoid any conflict between those jurisdictions.
The Department of Business and Trade press release of 29 of October indicates that the agreement should help support investigations and work on parallel cases involving issues such as unfair competition practices between the UK and EU member states.
Ratification of the agreement will follow in due course.
Link to the UK Press Release
New UK-EU Competition Cooperation Agreement - GOV.UK
Link to the EU Press Release
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