The UK's competition watchdog has warned it will be flooded with new cases in a no-deal scenario, as it currently relies on EU to investigate matters affecting consumers across Europe, such as the proposed Sainsbury's-Asda merger. In a no-deal scenario, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) would have to investigate all merger and competition cases affecting UK citizens, even if the companies involved are not UK-based. The government allocated an extra £20m ($25m) to the CMA in 2019 to cope with an expected workload increase, but the regulator called for a co-operative arrangement with the the European Commission on information exchange.
The UK's competition watchdog has warned it will be flooded with new cases in a no-deal scenario, as it currently relies on the European Commission to investigate matters affecting consumers across Europe, such as the proposed Sainsbury's-Asda merger. In a no-deal scenario, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) would have to investigate all merger and competition cases affecting UK citizens, even if the companies involved are not UK-based. The government allocated an extra £20m ($25m) to the CMA in 2019 to cope with an expected workload increase, but the regulator called for a co-operative arrangement with the EU on information exchange.