Court upholds ruling in galvanised steel tanks cartel investigations

First published by Author on March 21, 2019 in the following categories: Cartels Investigations Price Fixing Pricing and tagged with cartels | cma | competition law | price fixing | pricing

The Court of Appeal has upheld a previous ruling obtained by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) that’s related to the galvanised steel tanks cartel case.

Supplier Balmoral Tanks were fined £130,000.00 for exchanging competitively-sensitive information with competitors, despite refusing to engage in the main cartel they’d been invited to join. They’d tried to have the ruling overturned in 2017, which failed, and we’re glad to see the Court of Appeal has upheld the initial rulings.

The galvanised steel tanks cartel case has been a huge, long-running investigation involving the CMA. Although Balmoral were not a part of the main cartel, they still infringed vital competition law.

Background to Balmoral and the galvanised steel tanks cartel

In July 2012, Balmoral were invited to join what has since been known as the galvanised steel tanks cartel, which they refused to engage in. However, they still went on to share competitively-sensitive information with three other competitors anyway.

Their behaviour was caught on camera in a secret meeting that was been covertly recorded by the CMA.

As a result of their behaviour, they were fined £130,000.00 by the CMA for breaches of vital competition law. This decision is separate to the main cartel infringement decision given they were not a party to the main price-fixing scandal. The amount is also said to be reflective of the fact that they did refuse to engage in the cartel.

In October 2017, the Competition Appeal Tribunal upheld the initial findings and the subsequent fine. The Court of Appeal has also upheld the decision.

Any sharing of pricing information and pricing strategies can be a breach of important competition law and should be punishable with fines. Although Balmoral refused to engage in the cartel, they still shared information, and they also should not have engaged in any of these discussions at all.

The importance of the galvanised steel tanks cartel case

The importance of the galvanised steel tanks cartel case simply cannot be understated. The CMA continues to clamp down hard on cartels which only ever harm the consumer. All businesses should be aware that it’s their responsibility to immediately and clearly refuse to engage in any kind of cartel behaviour, or behaviour that can breach competition law, or discussions to that effect.

Speaking about the Court of Appeal upholding the Balmoral decision, the CMA’s Executive Director for Enforcement said:

“The CMA brought this case to send a strong signal to companies about these critical compliance obligations, which are needed to protect customers from the higher prices which result when competing businesses collude on price or business strategy, including through the exchange of competitively-sensitive information.”