This morning, the UK Competition & Markets Authority (CMA) banned Eurotunnel from operating ferries from Dover, thereby upholding its decision taken more than a year ago.
“ Today’s final report from the CMA is good news for DFDS and our 1,300 employees providing ferry services on the English Channel. We can now start to carry out our plans for the future. For the sake of all stakeholders, we hope the decision will be implemented as swiftly as possible,” says Niels Smedegaard, CEO of DFDS . Following today’s decision, a number of next steps remain before the case will be finally resolved. There is a four week period for lodging appeals to the Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) on the issues addressed in the decision (jurisdiction and material change of circumstance).
Furthermore, the CMA must issue an implementation order for the decision to become effective. This includes a four week consultation period from the issue of a draft order and a six month implementation period for closing down the banned ferry activities. The duration of the implementation process may be affected in the event of any appeals.
Given the remaining steps, DFDS now estimates that the implementation period for closing down the ferry activities will expire in Q1 2015.
Process timeline so far The main events of the process until today are outlined below. Between events a number of hearings with all involved parties have been held, and the involved parties’ responses to provisional findings have been examined.
[mappress] Press Release, June 27, 2014