OFT asked to shore itself up

OFT asked to shore itself up

	Published : Thu, 17 Nov 2005 18:05 By : Amy Watts Print this Story

Though, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) may be ranked high internationally as one of the best competition authorities, it needs to improve the way it investigates anti-competitive behaviour, says The National Audit Office (NAO), country’s public spending watchdog.

The gripe is that it takes a far too much time to investigate in some cases, is too guarded with people it is investigating and is understaffed at the highest level, according to the NAO.

According to a study by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), in some cases where its members were involved, OFT-related legal fees was above 200,000 pounds and certain cases costed as much as 1 million pounds.

In a report, NAO said: “The OFT needs to improve further its management of investigations so that they are quicker, more transparent and are more consistent in quality.” It also urged OFT to make sure that deadlines were adhered to provide information more quickly.

In April 2005, six of the 37 investigations of OFT had exceeded three years.

The NAO said the OFT’s turnover of competition enforcement staff was nearly 20 per cent last year and its vacancy rate was 12 per cent last September. This meant that it constantly faced a challenge of hiring and retraining employees. There was a gap in pay when compared to the private sector, which is impeding the recruitment and retention process. Also, “there is a limited number of candidates with the requisite blend of legal, economic and case management experience.”

Sir John Bourn, head of the NAO, was sure that the OFT’s new chairman, Philip Collins, and chief executive, John Fingleton were aware of the problems and are taking steps to resolve them, it emphasised that OFT needed “to meet these challenges head on”.

25 per cent of medium-sized firms believed they were affected due to unfair practices, but only a few of them said they would approach the OFT.

The OFT’s expenditure has also risen by more than 70 per cent to £56.8 million since 2000. NAO said though that this was due to the fact that OFT’s scope was increased, the organisation still needed to do more to quantify the benefit it would bring in.