ACCAN recently provided a joint submission, together with CHOICE and Consumers’ Federation of Australia (CFA), to the Treasury’s consultation on Revitalising National Competition Policy (NCP).

Our organisations welcome the Government’s goal of increasing effective competition across the economy. However, we urge the Government to treat the primary goal of competition policy to be improving outcomes for end users in markets, rather than to promote competition as an end in itself.

Policy settings should lead to markets that work for all consumers (or other end user participants) and account for the limits faced by consumers, including those experiencing vulnerability or disadvantage. We urge this message to be a focus for the whole of the review.

In our submission we make the following recommendations:

• The review of the National Competition Policies should be led by the goal of prioritising effective outcomes for the consumers, or end users, of markets, and account for distributional impacts.
• Amend the Legislation Review Principle so regulatory impact assessment processes account for the reduced capacity of consumers and consumer representatives to provide data and evidence of benefits to regulation, compared with large business and industry organisations.
• The Government should explore ways to make it easier for consumer organisations to participate in all competition related consultations, including by making funding available.
• Introduce a governance and reporting framework to improve transparency around the implementation of the Competitive Neutrality Principle.
• Update the Access principle to ensure that it provides a sufficiently clear mandate to allow for fair access to be provided to non-physical assets that are controlled by monopolies/oligopolies.
• The National Competition Principles should be led by a clear purpose statement that clarifies that their overarching goal is to improve the consumer outcomes in markets, including for those experiencing vulnerability or whose agency in markets is otherwise constrained.
• Ensure that the principles:

• make explicit reference to the limits of consumer empowerment, particularly in markets for human services and similar; and
• encourages market interventions that aim to pass the benefits of competition onto consumers when they are not in a position to exercise effective choice.

• Introduce a new market design and stewardship principle into the Principles that recognises the need for Government to ensure markets are working for end users, and to intervene where they are not.

Download: ACCAN Joint Submission to Treasury National Competition Policy164.98 KB

Download: ACCAN Joint Submission to Treasury National Competition Policy219.6 KB