As is often said of football referees, if both sides are unhappy with you, you are probably doing a good job. On this test, the European Commission (EC) must be getting more right than wrong. Yet, even to those who work within it, or are in regular contact with it, its ways are mysterious and its wonders never cease.
Certainly, when it comes to competition policy, its methods seem to baffle some on both sides of the Atlantic – just ask Airtours, Tetra Laval or General Electric, all of which had crucial mergers turned down by the EC, in the latter case after its merger with Honeywell Systems had been approved by the regulators in Washington DC. And with both the EC and the merger control regime on the brink of major reform, that is a situation that is likely to get worse before it gets better.
