Insurance, transport, medicines. There are several markets in the Italian economy where competition should increase, but there is one that even risks taking a step backwards: that ofelectric energy. The alarm was sounded by Giovanni Pitruzzella, president of the Antitrust, who this morning in his annual report to the Chamber underlined how in this sector "profound changes full of pitfalls are taking place", despite to date "liberalisations have fully developed ”.
According to the number one of the Authority, "in the presence of a stagnation in demand and a growing entry of plants powered by renewable sources, the market is no longer able to recognize coverage of fixed costs for thermoelectric plants". Hence the risk that operators will have to “conserve a large part of their production capacity – continued Pitruzzella -, with the probable consequence that the market will become concentrated again. In such a case, the negative effects in terms of price increases would be highly probable”.
The question of prices, on the other hand, is already a very serious problem in another sector, that ofRc car. To insure your car, Italians pay figures that are among the highest in Europe. “The average premium in Italy is more than double that paid in France and Portugal – Pitruzzella went on –, it exceeds the German one by 80% and the Dutch one by almost 70%”. This trend is often justified by the high number of frauds against insurance companies, but the president of the Antitrust underlined that the number of frauds ascertained in our country "is four times lower than that registered in the United Kingdom and half of that found in France”. This is why in the past the Authority has defined a reform of the sector that strengthens efficiency and competition as "indispensable".
Other margins of intervention exist, according to the president of the Antitrust, in the postal sector, "in order to encourage the entry of new operators that are truly competitive with respect to the incumbent and to expand the range of services to be made contestable, with an increase in the quantity and quality of services usable by consumers".
The law has already intervened, however, in the sector of transport. But a year and a half after the green light for the intervention, the project has not turned into reality. Pitruzzella signaled today that "the transport regulatory authority, established at the end of 2011, is not yet operational": an issue that "can no longer be postponed", if we want to protect "a fair competitive comparison in transport services railway".
Finally, the new frontier for Antitrust policies is that of drugs. In this area, the fundamental problem is the tension between the protection of patents and competition. According to the president of the Authority, "protection is essential to promote innovation, but an abusive and instrumental use of protection mechanisms can impede competition", keeping "artificially alive a higher price of drugs, with often negative repercussions on the public budget".
Last year, the Authority closed a case involving a pharmaceutical company accused of using intellectual property rights regulation to delay entry to the market for generic medicines, increasing costs for the NHS. The provision was canceled by the Lazio TAR and now the pronouncement of the Council of State is awaited. Meanwhile, the Antitrust has opened another investigation into two pharmaceutical companies suspected of having favored the marketing of a drug to the detriment of another drug.
The possible sanction would be added to those already received during 2012 and the period January-May 2013: a total of 182 million euros, of which 170 only for anti-competitive offences.
