STATUTES
| Published date | 01 November 1965 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1965.tb02795.x |
| Date | 01 November 1965 |
STATUTES
MONOPOLIES
AND
MERGERS
ACT,
1965
THE White Paper on Monopolies and Mergers appeared in
1964,
while
Mr.
Edward Heath was President of the Board of Trade.
Among its proposals were that the Monopolies Commission should
be empowered to investigate mergers which would result in the
acquisition by an enterprise of monopoly power in a market, and
that a Registrar of Mergers should be appointed to assist the Com-
mission in this task. The mea.sure introduced, in March
1965,
by
Mr.
Douglas Jay,
Mr.
Heath’s successor at the Board of Trade, did
not embody all the proposals of the White Paper, and differed from
it
in some respects. Severe pressure on parliamentary time rendered
it necessary that the measure should provide for the attainment of
its central objectives by the simplest means available. Hence,
instead
of
the oppointment of a new Registrar, the bodies already
exercising control over monopoly, the Board of Trade and the
Monopolies Commission, are to exercise also the control
of
mergers.
In spite of this and other differences from the White Paper, the
measure’s bipartisan origins enabled it
to
have a relatively smooth
passage through Parliament, and it received the Royal Assent on
August
5,
1905.
The Act consists of twelve sections and three Schedules, and has
to be read in conjunction with the Monopolies and Restrictive
Practices (Inquiry and Control) Act,
1948,2
for it is drafted in the
form
of
a supplement to that Act rather than as a consolidation of
existing statute law in this field. Its main objectives are as follows:
(a) to enlarge the Monopolies Commission and widen its
jurisdiction and powers;
(b) to extend the powers available to the Board of Trade in
taking action against practices referred to in reports of the
Monopolies Commission
;
and
(c) to provide (for the first time) a procedure for assessing the
effects
of
major mergers, and the powers to prohibit
or
dissolve mergers not considered
in
the public interest.
(a)
Enlargement
of
the Jurisdiction and Size
of
the
Monopolies Commission
Section
1
restores to the Monopolies Commission the size and
organisation that it possessed from
1953
until it was reduced to its
1
Cmnd. 2299.
2
11
&
12
Geo.
6,
c.
66,
referred to in the
Act,
and in this note,
88
“
the
principal Act.”
693
VOL.
28
24
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