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The Rail Regulator Tom Winsor has called for the railway industry to follow the example of the telecommunications industry in setting up a Compliance Forum to minimise the risk of infringements of the Competition Act 1998, which came into effect on 1 March 2000. Speaking today at the Twenty-fifth Statutory Meeting of the Central Rail Users Consultative Committee in London, Tom Winsor said:
"The jurisdiction of the Competition Act is determined by the subject matter of the agreement concerned – whether or not it relates to the supply of railway services. It does not depend on whether the undertaking concerned is licenced under the Railways Act. Application of the Competition Act to the railway industry is the joint responsibility of myself and the Director General of Fair Trading, and a commercial agreement or business conduct relating to the supply of railway services will generally be dealt with by my Office.
"I expect companies to implement corporate compliance programmes to minimise the risk of infringing the Competition Act by systematically ensuring that all relevant employees are sufficiently knowledgeable about the provisions of the law, and that they will put that knowledge to good effect. To develop the compliance culture that will ensure that this happens, I would like to see the railway industry follow the example of the telecommunications industry and create a Compliance Forum. Developing a compliance programme is not just about producing nicely bound documents which gather dust on managers’ bookshelves."
Notes on the Competition Act: Applications to the Railway Sector are available as an Acrobat PDF file. [[see related document 1]]
Railnews Archive ::: 2000-03-15 ORR-001
related documents
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2001-10-15 Byers meets Railtrack (Department of Transport, Local Government and the Regions)