Source: https://competitionbulletin.com/tag/competition-law/
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 06:30:55+00:00

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The recent decision of the High Court in Vattenfall AB v Prysmian SpA  EWHC 1694 (Ch) is another example of claimants being allowed to use non-addressee English subsidiaries as anchor defendants for their competition damages claims. It is also another example of the court considering but not actually having to decide the interesting legal points around attribution of liability which potentially arise in such cases.
There have now been several cases with the same basic structure: the European Commission decides that a company is liable for a competition law infringement and some claimants then start proceedings against that company’s English subsidiary in order to establish jurisdiction in England. The defendant objects to the claimants’ attempt to sue an entity which was not, after all, an addressee of the Commission’s decision simply to use it as a means of bringing proceedings in London.
The problem which defendants face in such a scenario, and the reason why they keep losing these cases, is that it is relatively easy for claimants to allege that the English subsidiary was knowingly involved in the infringement. If the Commission has found that there was an EU-wide infringement then it will often be entirely proper for the claimants to infer, at least sufficiently to meet the low threshold for establishing jurisdiction, that the infringement was implemented in England through the English subsidiary. In Vatenfall the claimants had the additional benefit of being able to point to concrete evidence in support of their knowing implementation plea. Provided that such a plea is properly made, a standalone claim can be run against the English subsidiary which can then be used as the anchor defendant.
The more interesting legal question is what the position would be if a claimant cannot properly plead a standalone case of knowing implementation against the English subsidiary. Could the parent’s liability be attributed to the subsidiary so that the subsidiary can be sued and used as an anchor defendant even though it was not involved in the cartel? The English judges who have considered this question have expressed different views about it.
One view is that the answer is that liability can be attributed from an infringing subsidiary to its parent company but not the other way round. Supporters of this view point to the fact that, when discussing attribution of liability in the line of cases starting with Akzo Nobel NV v European Commission  5 CMLR 23, the European Courts have been concerned only with imputing liability to a parent company, and that they only permit such attribution if the parent exercised a ‘decisive influence’ over the infringing subsidiary.
The problem, however, is that the reasoning in the Akzo Nobel line of cases is expressed in quite wide-reaching terms. The basic logic is that if the parent and subsidiary are part of the same single economic unit then they form a single undertaking, and that if an undertaking infringes competition law then all of its legal entities are liable for the breach. The ‘decisive influence’ test is really about determining whether the parent and subsidiary are part of the same economic unit, not an additional threshold for the attribution of liability between companies which are in the same economic unit.
Thus the alternative view is that the liability can be attributed between any and all companies in the same undertaking. This has caused some consternation among English judges because of its apparently wide-reaching consequences. Does it mean that liability could be attributed to a subsidiary with no knowledge of or involvement in a cartel? Or even from one subsidiary to another?
In the Sainsbury’s case ( CAT 11) at  the CAT suggested something of a compromise: liability could be attributed between companies in the same undertaking but only if they had “in some way” participated in the breach or otherwise exercised a decisive influence over a company which did. That is a sensible solution, but it might be said that it still sits somewhat uncomfortably with the reasoning in Akzo Nobel.
A different way of formulating the point might be as follows. In accordance with the reasoning in Akzo Nobel, liability can always be attributed between companies in the same undertaking. However, when asking whether companies are in the same “undertaking” one needs to keep in mind that the identification of an undertaking depends on the circumstances. In a competition infringement case, the question is whether the companies acted as a single economic unit for the purposes of the infringement. If they did then they are all part of the same undertaking and they are all liable. If they did not then they are not part of the relevant undertaking and liability cannot be attributed to them from any other company in the group.
If this approach is correct then a subsidiary which genuinely had nothing to do with an infringement will not be liable for it. But a subsidiary which, whether knowingly or not, acted in concert with other group companies such that they operated as a single economic unit to implement an infringement will be liable for it. That is essentially (with slightly different reasoning) the approach which appealed to the CAT in Sainsbury’s, and it is a solution which avoids some of the extremes of other proposed solutions.
When the UK leaves the EU, the rules governing jurisdiction in cross-border competition damages claims will likely change. Most immediately, this will impact those who had acquired pre-Brexit causes of action for breach of statutory duty under section 2(1) of the European Communities Act 1972, based on Articles 101 and Articles 102 TFEU. The doctrine of acquired rights would preserve such causes of action; but it is unlikely to preserve EU rules of jurisdiction in relation to them. Thereafter, the changes will impact those able to establish post-Brexit causes of action based on foreign laws, as Kieron Beal QC has explained. In either case, Claimants may wish to establish English jurisdiction, including as against EU domiciled defendants. This post considers some of the issues likely to be encountered.
Currently, jurisdiction in such cases is governed by the Recast Brussels Regulation (EU) No. 1215/2012 (the “Recast Regulation”). Despite the Prime Minister’s suggestion that the Great Repeal Bill will convert the entirety of the ‘acquis’ into British law, it seems unlikely that the Regulation will survive without more. It is a prime example of EU legislation predicated on reciprocity and the principle of mutual trust and recognition: see e.g. Recitals (3) and (26) of the Recast Regulation. In the absence of an arrangement between the UK and the rest of the EU to maintain post-Brexit common rules on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments, the premise for the Recast Regulation falls away.
At present, there are no such arrangements in place between the EU and third states. It is true that Denmark entered into an agreement with the rest of the EC in relation to the predecessor of the Recast Regulation, the Brussels I Regulation. But Denmark was and remains a Member State. Whether a similar agreement is sought by or available to the UK as a non-Member State remains to be seen.
An alternative would be for the UK to seek to accede to the Lugano Convention 2007, which applies between the EU and Norway, Switzerland, Iceland and Denmark. However, Article 70 of the Convention restricts accession to members of EFTA, members of the EU acting on behalf of non-European territories which form part of them or for whose external relations they are responsible, and those states that can satisfy the conditions in Article 72, which include the unanimous consent of the Contracting States. It is reasonable to think that a condition of any such consent would include submission in some form by the UK to the jurisdiction of the CJEU in relation to interpretation of the Lugano Convention. Even if such consent were forthcoming, it is worthwhile noting that there are important differences between the Lugano Convention and the Recast Regulation. For example, Article 31(2) of the Recast Regulation has gone some way to disarming (in exclusive jurisdiction clause cases, at least) the “Italian torpedo” which still fires under the Lugano Convention owing to its rigid “first seised” lis pendens rule. Further, the process of recognition and enforcement of judgments under the Recast Regulation is more streamlined than that which prevails under the Lugano Convention.
Failing either of these options, there is a serious question over whether the UK remains a party to the Brussels Convention, having acceded to it in its own right in 1978. The Recast Regulation and its predecessor make clear that these instruments superseded the Convention as between Member States, except as regards the territories of the Member States which fell within the scope of the Convention but were excluded from the Regulations pursuant to Article 299 TEC and Article 355 TFEU respectively. The UK was a Member State when these Regulations were adopted and was not excluded from their provisions superseding the Brussels Convention. Brexit will not turn the UK into a territory of a Member State excluded from the Recast by virtue of Article 355 TFEU, only into a country to which TFEU does not apply at all. It is therefore difficult to see how the application of the Brussels Convention to the UK can be revived. In any event, as Adrian Briggs QC has underscored, no country ratified the Convention after 2001 so it would not create a framework for jurisdiction with all EU Member States.
In the absence of an agreed bilateral framework, the UK will revert to applying its domestic rules on jurisdiction. These would permit the English Court to assume jurisdiction over EU domiciled defendants based on a far broader range of factors than are presently provided for by the Recast Regulation. Defendants with a mere (including fleeting) presence in the jurisdiction would be liable to be served here, even if domiciled elsewhere. Defendants with no such presence would also be liable to service outside the jurisdiction, with the Court’s permission, based on a far broader range of territorial and other connections under CPR r. 6.37 and PD 6B than are presently available under the Recast’s jurisdictional rules.
The purpose of the Recast Regulation and its predecessors is to protect EU domiciled defendants from such national rules of jurisdiction: see Article 5(2). A post-Brexit world in which the EU refuses to agree a new bilateral arrangement on cross-border jurisdiction with the UK will result in the application of English domestic law rules against EU citizens for the first time since accession to the Brussels Convention. Depending on how the English Court’s discretionary powers to stay proceedings or permit service out on forum conveniens grounds are exercised, there is real potential for the English Courts to enlarge their effective jurisdiction over competition law claims against EU domiciled defendants.
At present, an EU domiciled defendant can only be sued in England in “matters relating to tort etc.” where England is the place where the “harmful event” “occurs or may occurs”: see Article 7(2) of the Recast. That requires showing in a cartel case that England is where the cartel was “definitively concluded” or that England is where “the [victim’s] own registered office is located”: see CDC (C-352/13)  Q.B. 906. The equivalent common law gateway for service out in CPR PD 6B, para 3.1(9) is broader in scope, e.g. it would require only that the damage sustained results from “an act committed… within the jurisdiction” (emphasis added). It would likely suffice that some substantial and efficacious aspect of the cartel could be located in England.
At present, an EU domiciled defendant can only be joined as a co-defendant to English proceedings where an English-domiciled anchor defendant has been sued here: see Article 8(1) of the Recast. There is no such limitation under the common law necessary or proper party gateway in CPR PD 6B, para. 3.1(3). Thus, if English jurisdiction can be established by service on an anchor Defendant – whether within or outside the jurisdiction – that suffices to expose other Defendants to the risk of joinder to English proceedings. In a cartel case, for example, the requirements of the necessary and proper party gateway will ordinarily not be difficult to satisfy.
At present, an applicable jurisdiction clause for another Member State court has a “trump card” status under the Recast. Even if the party able to rely on that clause is one of many sued in England, and even if the sound administration of justice would favour not giving effect to it in the circumstances, the English Court is nonetheless bound to do so under Art. 25(1) of the Recast. Not so at common law, where the Court would retain a discretion – and in an appropriate case could decline to give effect to the clause so as to ensure that the entire dispute remain in the English Court: see e.g. Donohue v Armco  UKHL 64;  1 All E.R. 749.
On account of the common jurisdictional rules in place under the Recast Regulation and the underlying principle of mutual trust, EU law prevents English Courts from granting anti-suit relief in respect of proceedings before courts elsewhere in the EU. In the absence of a similar multilateral arrangement post-Brexit, English Courts are unlikely to feel inhibited from applying ordinary principles on anti-suit relief, e.g. to restrain a party from pursuing in the EU proceedings brought in breach of jurisdiction or arbitration clauses, or proceedings which are vexatious and oppressive or otherwise unconscionable.
Perhaps then, at least in the context of competition damages claims, if the effect of Brexit is that we return to common law rules, there will be some hidden treasure.
So in what direction should clients be advised to row their boats in the run up to Brexit? English jurisdiction and arbitration clauses are likely to remain valuable tools in dispute resolution so it will continue to make sense to include them in new contracts; it may also be prudent to review old contracts to insert such clauses or to revise those drafted by reference to EU legislation. In doing so, it will be important to pay close attention to the remarks made by Rix LJ and the CJEU respectively in Ryanair Limited v Esso Italiana Srl  EWCA Civ 1450 and the CDC case. The effect of each is that (at least some) tort claims founded on breaches of competition law will not ordinarily be caught by even broadly-worded jurisdiction clauses (e.g. those providing for jurisdiction over “all disputes arising from contractual relationships”): express words will be necessary. The scope of the principles stated in these decisions is likely to be a fertile area of dispute in competition law cases, not least because some claims (e.g. those in a bid-rigging context) have a more obvious connection to contracts containing such jurisdiction clauses than others (e.g. the price-fixing cartel contexts of Ryanair and CDC).
As for litigation strategy more generally, depending on which jurisdictional framework the UK ends up embracing, there may be significant value in re-considering the torpedoes and injunctions which we have seen submerged in EU competition litigation in recent years.
 Subject, of course, to any transitional arrangements to the contrary.
 While the EU and several third states are party to the Hague Convention on Choice of Court Agreements 2005, it deals only with exclusive jurisdiction agreements.
 See, for example, the decisions in Turner v Grovit (C-159/02  ECR I-3565) and West Tankers (C-185/07).
Once notification is given by the UK Government of its intention to withdraw from the European Union under Article 50 TFEU, EU law will cease to apply in the UK after the expiry of two years (absent an agreement between all 28 Member States extending the relevant period). What then happens to the UK’s competition law regime, which is closely intertwined with EU law, both substantively and procedurally?
The answer will depend to a large extent on the terms of the Great Repeal Bill. What is clear, however, is that the provisions of Article 101 and 102 TFEU will no longer apply within the territory of the United Kingdom. Those Articles presently have direct effect in the UK legal order. General principles of EU law, including the principle of direct effect, are binding in the UK under Article 6 TEU, read in conjunction with sections 2 and 3 of the European Communities Act 1972. But it seems inevitable that the Great Repeal Bill will remove the direct effect of substantive EU competition law. Moreover, Regulation 1/2003 (the Modernisation Regulation) will no longer be directly applicable in this jurisdiction. But the terms of the Competition Act 1998 (‘CA 1998’) will still apply. The Chapter I prohibition, for example, prohibits cartel conduct producing an actual or potential effect on trade within the United Kingdom. The provisions of the CA 1998 can no doubt continue in force largely unamended, save of course for section 60 CA 1998 with its focus on aligning as far as possible the position adopted by domestic and EU law on parallel issues.
It will be no secret to those reading this blog that competition law claims in the UK have increased in number in recent years. The ‘mystery of the reluctant plaintiff’ finally seemed to have been resolved. Many of these claims have been brought on the basis of Articles 101 TFEU, Article 53 of the EEA Agreement and the Chapter I prohibition contained in section 2 CA 1998. Indeed, some of these claims have also incorporated claims based on the applicable laws of tort in other Member States of the EU. Does the departure of the UK from the EU mean that these claims will no longer be brought? The answer is very likely to be no. There are two principal reasons.
First, there has been no suggestion that claims seeking to enforce accrued rights to damages cannot be brought once the UK leaves the EU. Anyone who is the victim of cartel conduct, for example, will continue to have rights under EU law which confer a right to damages up until the UK’s departure from the EU. The Great Repeal Bill cannot lawfully deprive victims of the benefit of these accrued rights without seriously risking falling foul of Article 1 of Protocol 1 to the European Convention on Human Rights. The English legal system should accordingly continue to recognise the tortious liability of Defendants for damage that occurred while EU law was applicable in this jurisdiction.
Secondly, a distinction needs to be drawn between jurisdiction and applicable law. Once jurisdiction is established against one or more Defendants within this jurisdiction, the question of which claims may be pleaded and proved against them is a question of the applicable law of the tort. At the moment, the applicable law for competition claims for loss arising after 10 January 2009 is determined by the application of the Rome II Regulation (and principally by Article 6(3)). That Regulation will no longer be binding on English courts once we leave the EU. But absent any legislative intervention in the Great Repeal Bill, the default position will then be that the pre-Rome II legislative framework will continue to apply. Section 15A of the Private International Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1995 (‘PILMPA 1995’) suspends the application of that Act when the Rome II Regulation applies. It follows that, when the Rome II Regulation is not applicable (either by virtue of its temporal or geographical scope), then the provisions of PILMPA 1995 remain fully effective.
The 1995 Act abolished the common law requirement of “double-actionability.” So free-standing claims for breach of the competition laws of other Member States – and of Articles 101 and 102 TFEU – can still be advanced in the courts of England and Wales, if the criteria for liability under those laws is met. Where, for example, a claimant sustains loss both in the EU markets and in the UK, there is no reason in principle why a claim for all of its loss cannot be brought in England. Expert evidence would be needed as to what the contents of those laws – including of EU law – are. See section 4(1) of the Civil Evidence Act 1972. But it is common for commercially significant cases to involve the pleading and proof by experts of causes of action based on foreign laws. Sections 11 and 12 of the PILMPA 1995 determine how the applicable law of the relevant tort or torts is to be selected.
But this provision is highly unlikely to prevent a claim being brought for compensation on the basis of the foreign laws of one or more jurisdictions. A claim for compensation based on a breach of a foreign competition law (or foreign law of tort or delict) is not the enforcement of a penal law. Such claims do not amount to an attempt to enforce a competition law which gives the national competition authorities in those foreign jurisdictions powers to fine cartelists. In Huntington v. Attrill  AC 150, PC, Lord Watson at p. 157-158 stated: “A proceeding, in order to come within the scope of the rule, must be in the nature of a suit in favour of the State whose law has been infringed.” That is not the case where a claimant (who is in any event not likely to be a public body in a foreign state) is claiming a compensatory remedy rather than enforcing a fine or penalty. See United States Securities and Exchange Commission v. Manterfield  EWCA Civ 27;  1 W.L.R. 172, CA per Waller LJ at  to .
It follows that if jurisdiction of the English Courts can be established, then there is no insuperable impediment to claimants bringing claims for loss arising from cartels and other anti-competitive conduct in much the same way as they do at present.
 The “mystery of the reluctant plaintiff” was a reference by J. Maitland-Walker at a conference in London, 1982, cited in Enric Picañol, Remedies in national law for breach of Articles 85 and 86 of the EEC Treaty – a Review, Legal Issues of European Integration, Deventer No. 2 (1983) 1 at page 2. Comprehensive reasons why there were not more claims under the pre-Modernisation competition regime were provided by John Temple Lang in EEC Competition Actions in Member States’ Courts – Claims for damages, declarations and injunctions for breach of Community Antitrust Law (1983-4) vol. 7 Fordham Intl L.J. 389 at page 407.
 Regulation (EC) No 864/2007 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 July 2007 on the law applicable to non-contractual obligations.

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