A. Types of Competences of the EU.

1

The powers that are attributed to the Union can be divided into three types: a) exclusive, b) shared and c) supplementary (or complementary) competence, each of them applies to particular explicitly-mentioned-by the TEU and TFEU.

When a treaty grants the EU «exclusive competence» in a specific area, only the Union may legislate and adopt acts with binding effect in that area, while the Member States are not allowed to act unilaterally, unless the Union grants them explicitly the power to implement such measures. 

B. Competences with regards to Competition Law - Legal Basis

2

Competition law is basically the relationship between a number of undertakings which sell goods or services of the same kind at the same kind to an identifiable group of customers.It is considered to be the fundamental basis for an open and unified market and has been identified as in being within the «exclusive competence» of the European Union, in order to implement an internal market between all Member States.

3

The TFEU under Art. 3 par.a 1 b clearly attributes exclusive competence to the EU concerning the establishment of the competition rules, necessary for the functioning of the internal market.

4

In order to legislate a measure concerning the Competition Law the Union has to take into consideration Art. 101 and 102 TFEU and should adopt the following procedure under Art.103 (1) TFEU: i) submission of a formal proposal by the Commission to the Council, ii) which then shall ask the European Parliament for its opinion on the proposed measures. Whereas the Commission is not bounded by the Parliament’s opinion, must in any case receive it. In practice the Council would frequently disregards Parliament’s suggestions and even sometimes reaches an agreement before receiving Parliament's opinion. However, it has been ruled by the ECJ in the «Roquette Fréres» case that the Council must wait in any case for the Parliament’s opinion. In the above mentioned case, the ECJ cancelled the legislation that was adopted without Parliament giving its opinion.

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