Rising to the Competitiveness Challenge – A New Era for EU Competition Policy?

The report of Mario Draghi, first published in September 2024, states that competition policy must adapt to ensure greater focus on fostering innovation and restoring the EU’s long-term competitiveness. Many of the ideas in this report have featured heavily in the mission letters sent by European commission President Ursula von der Leyen to Commissioners-designate. This panel of experts explores how concepts in the Draghi report may be incorporated into any future Commission guidelines and how the report will influence the new Commission’s approach to competition enforcement. The panel also reflects on whether Europe’s competition policy harms its competitiveness or whether it offers an avenue through which to boost Europe’s competitiveness. This panel event is hosted in conjunction with the Economic Regulators Network (ERN). About the Speakers: Olivier Guersent is the Director-General of the Directorate General for Competition. He joined the European Commission in 1992 and was initially with the “Merger Task Force” in the Directorate-General for Competition. From 2010 to 2014, he was the head of the private office of Michel Barnier, Commissioner for Internal Market and Service. Having held the position of Deputy Director-General since July 2014, Olivier has been Director-General of the Directorate-General for Financial Stability, Financial Service and Capital Markets Union from September 2015 to December 2019. Brian McHugh was appointed Chair of the Irish NCA, the CCPC in August 2023, having previously served as a Member of the CCPC from 2017. Prior to his appointment to the CCPC, he spent 15 years in Northern Ireland’s Utility Regulator, the body responsible for both regulating the gas, electricity and water utility industries in Northern Ireland. During his time at the Utility Regulator, Brian was Director of Gas and Director of Finance & Network Assets. Brian holds a BA in Economics from Trinity College, Dublin, and an MSc in Energy Economics from the University of Surrey. Professor Imelda Maher is the Sutherland Full Professor of European Law and Director of the UCD Dublin European Institute. She is a member of the Royal Irish Academy and has been Senior Vice President since 2023. She is an honorary bencher of Middle Temple London, and she serves on the Advisory Board of the Cambridge Centre for European Legal Studies, the Max Planck Institute of Innovation and Competition, Munich, and the Institute for Consumer Antitrust Studies, Loyola University, Chicago. Professor Maher was the first Irish woman to become President of the Society of Legal Scholars of the UK and Ireland (2016-2017), the largest scholarly society of common law lawyers in Europe and is a founding member of the European Law Institute, Vienna. Loretta O’Sullivan is the Chief Economist and Partner at EY Ireland. Loretta has been working in the economics field for almost 20 years in both the public and private sectors, on a wide range of Irish, European and global issues. She was previously the Chief Economist at Bank of Ireland and the Senior Economist in the Monetary Policy and International Relations Division at the Central Bank of Ireland. Loretta holds a PhD in Economics from Trinity College Dublin and an MA in Policy, Management and Government from the University of York.