Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I think they are totally separate functions but we are all responsible for that. We may have proposed it, and it may have happened then after 2011. I cannot quite remember but consumer protection law is one thing. Competition law, of course, is related to it but they are very different roles. I would love to hear more on the competition law side, to be honest.

The mandate of the CCPC has been extended, to be fair. It has more powers, and the 2022 Act was groundbreaking. Breaches of competition law can now be enforced through administrative actions taken by competition authorities, and the fines are significant - €10 million or 10% of turnover. The Consumer Rights Act 2022 makes consumer contract law simpler to understand and navigate, strengthens consumer protections and provides businesses with clearer rules on their obligations towards consumers. The EU General Product Safety Regulations, which came into force in December 2024, modernise the product safety framework and address the new challenges posed to product safety by the digitalisation of our economies.

The CCPC has also got a range of other functions in other various pieces of EU legislation as well, and it has taken prosecutions against retailers in 2024 and 2025 under price indications regulations, which is a slightly different thing, and for breaking sales pricing legislation. I also see from its website that there have been a number of raids etc. with regard to the competition law side as well.

The resources for the CCPC have gone up significantly, by 90% since 2020. Its headcount has grown, and as part of the development of the action plan on competitiveness and productivity, this Government has given a commitment that competition and consumer protection enforcement will be strengthened. The Department of enterprise is committed to further strengthening the CCPC’s capacity to deliver in line with these commitments and is actively developing a related miscellaneous Bill to achieve this. Part of this will include changes in the law to give the CCPC the power to impose large fines for serious breaches of consumer law, for example to allow the CCPC to issue fines that are a percentage of turnover. In addition, the Department is also examining the potential to give the CCPC powers to collect, organise and study public procurement data to find and prevent bid-rigging cartels, and I think that is a really important proposal.

While welcoming the general tenor of the Bill, it is essential that any proposed legislative or regulatory changes are informed by robust evidence and will achieve the objective of the Bill in a focused way and not give rise to unintended consequences. The Bill will, of course, require extensive scrutiny from a policy, legal and financial perspective to ensure the benefits outweigh the risks.

The CCPC already has many powers. It can investigate anticompetitive practices, including the abuse of dominance; conduct market studies and enforcement actions; appoint authorised officers with powers to enter premises, seize documents and compel information, and we have seen recent examples of that; co-operate with other national and international bodies; and bring civil or criminal proceedings for breaches of competition law. The Act does not explicitly empower the CCPC to focus on unfair pricing as a stand-alone issue, conduct profit margin analyses or cost-based pricing studies, or require the publication of such studies with a consumer welfare priority.

The Department believes the Bill would benefit from additional legal analysis. The Minister goes on to talk about some other issues in the Bill that could be considered. I will leave them on the record but they would be factors that would come into a scrutiny process for the Bill. One thing the Department says is that the Bill applies to all undertakings, from sole-trading farmers to large FDI companies, and that would represent a signal change in policy. What constitutes an excessive profit or margin is very subjective. There is no law preventing businesses from making excessive profits nor is there any law preventing a business from being in a dominant position. We do not have the monopolisation laws they have in America; we have laws relating to abuse of a dominant position.

The Bill proposes to give the CCPC powers to undertake studies, analyses or surveys and to request information from undertakings when investigating potential breaches of section 5 of the Competition Act, as amended. The CCPC’s existing powers contained in the Competition and Consumer Protection Act 2014 are sufficient, the Department says, for the purpose of analysing markets and for requesting information from undertakings to investigate potential breaches of competition law. To this end, it should be noted that the CCPC has recently employed its powers to request information in a number of investigations.

The Department believes that the focus on unfair pricing as a stand-alone issue is not necessary because the CCPC can already investigate the issue of unfair pricing.

We do not believe this needs to be explicitly called out in the Bill as it is already covered by what the CCPC can investigate. On conducting profit margin analysis and cost-based pricing studies, the CCPC may not currently have the knowledge and expertise to run these studies. Any expansion of knowledge and expertise to include such studies would require additional staffing and resources.

In regard to the publication of such studies with consumer welfare as a priority, it should be highlighted that all studies the CCPC produces and publishes intend to benefit consumer welfare already, so I believe this does not need to be explicitly called out in the Bill. In addition, the CCPC is responsible for consumer protection and enforcement of legislation in that sphere.

The Bill's enforcement mechanisms, such as the power to require information and conduct investigations, may place a significant administrative burden, and this burden could be particularly challenging for smaller retailers, in particular, with limited resources. As currently drafted, the Bill makes no distinction regarding the size of businesses. The Government and the EU have commitments to simplification and reduction of administrative burdens on our businesses. I reiterate that competition law is there to protect consumers as well and to ensure businesses can succeed. Businesses can lose out as well if one business is using its dominant position or engaging in price fixing.

The Bill introduces criminal penalties and we believe the introduction of criminal penalties would need further scrutiny. As it stands, the Bill is also contradictory on the proposed new powers for the CCPC in that it requires it to have due regard for commercial confidentiality when publishing studies, analyses or surveys, but the interests and welfare of consumers are stated as the paramount consideration. Balancing these two could be challenging.

We will not be opposing this Bill, so when progressing to the next Stage, these areas will need to be examined to ensure no duplication or overlapping of work and that the additional powers conferred on the CCPC are proportionate and benefit both consumers and business.

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