The Competitive Edge

Australia’s new, formal, mandatory and suspensory merger regime comes into effect on a voluntary basis on 1 July this year and will be mandatory from 1 January 2026. Join G+T partners Elizabeth Avery, Louise Klamka and Jeremy Jose for a webinar first livestreamed in April on the coming notification thresholds and waivers, the timelines, the new framing of the merger test, the long and the short of the forms – and the pieces of the puzzle still to come. And keep an eye out for the next webinar on 18 June!

• Presentation slides 
• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
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Partners Elizabeth Avery and Liana Witt report back from a very different American Bar Association Spring Meeting in Washington DC, and take us through recent upheavals in US competition and consumer law. What is the new “America First” antitrust, what does it mean for global deals, big tech and AI, and how will it impact Australia and the rest of the world? Plus digital platforms and the new regime, the ACCC bags a penalty in ocean plastics and has no truck with LDV's SUVs, and what to expect from the newly returned government …  All this and more with co-hosts Moya Dodd and Matt Rubinstein.  [Links]  

• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
• Email us at [email protected]  

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In this bonus episode, we rejoin Professor Emerita Anne Twomey for more on how media is regulated at election time. How could AI be deployed in political advertising? What is misinformation anyway, and who should decide what is verifiably true or false? Can truth in political advertising be legislated? And what's the future of debate in the town square - or are we all on our own private bubble?  

• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
• Email us at [email protected]

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Professor Emerita Anne Twomey, constitutional law expert and G+T consultant, takes us through the regulation of elections: misinformation, disinformation and the implied freedom of political communication. Plus the new draft merger thresholds, targeted sectors and forms; the High Court's understanding of "understanding" in the ACCC's case against Hutchinson and the CFMEU; the Digital Platform Services Inquiry wraps up, and we check in on the parties' election platforms. All this and voodoo economics with co-hosts Moya Dodd and Matt Rubinstein.   

• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
• Email us at [email protected]  

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Economist and former head of  the Competition Authority of Ireland and the UK Office of Fair Trading  John Fingleton CBE  joins us from the Competition Taskforce to talk about Australia's recent and future reforms, the role of ex ante regulation and the shifting sands of antitrust in the US, the UK and Europe.  Plus competition and consumer protection in the Australian budget,  the ACCC's draft merger assessment and process guidelines, and the US agencies boycott an antitrust conference.  All this and jerseys vs guernseys with co-hosts Moya Dodd and Matt Rubinstein.

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Partner Louise Klamka and Special Counsel Rebecca Dollisson take us through the risks and rewards of business cooperation, from Virgin and Qatar to the Vanilla Ice Posse. When can you talk to your competitors, when should you talk to your lawyer, and when do you need the ACCC? Plus the roadmap to the new merger clearance framework, the new scam prevention framework and some questionable consumer law limericks, why is there only one Monopolies Commission, and what is the new National Competition Policy? All this and the price of eggs with co-hosts Moya Dodd and Matt Rubinstein.  

• G+T on the transitional arrangements to the new merger control regime 
• New Scientist's monopolies commission joke joke  
• Sinead O'Connor's "No Need to Argue"  and Phoebe Bridgers's "Fake Plastic Trees" on YouTube 
• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
• Email us at [email protected]  

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The ACCC's compliance and enforcement priorities are here and Partner Simon Muys reads between the lines on the new merger framework, the global zeitgeist and where private litigation fits in. Plus a re-evaluation of competition law, regulation and national champions; DeepSeek takes the Fast and Furious challenge; all the Niue/New Zealand numismatics news; and a new competition-law-themed cryptic crossword to reflect these convoluted times. All this and absurd alliteration with co-hosts Moya Dodd and Matt Rubinstein.  

• Louis Dreyfus Company/Namoi on the ACCC's register and all of Elaine's get-outs  
• PM Malcolm Turnbull on Continuity and/with Change 
• The Draghi Report on European competitiveness  and the Commission's Competitiveness Compass 
• Doug Gurr's three things the CMA will be doing differently from now on 
• Marco Materazzi heinously headbutts Zinedine Zidane  
• The official rules of international rules 
• Is This What We Want? by 1000 UK artists on Spotify 
• The ACCC's new consumer protection action against the Bradford Exchange 
• G+T's competition and consumer insights for 2024-25 and our summary of the ACCC's priorities 
• The Competitive Edge Cryptic Crossword #6 and all the other crosswords  
• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
• Email us at [email protected]  

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Chief Advisor Marcus Bezzi joins us to talk about his time at Treasury's Competition Taskforce, merger reform implementation, the future of our National Competition Policy and the next chapter in a life of competition law and policy. Plus antitrust shifts in the US and the UK, new judges for the Federal Court, merger reviews and non-reviews in smartphone apps, and a look at the year ahead … All this and low-fat yoghurt with co-hosts Moya Dodd and Matt Rubinstein.   Links  

• Aunty Jack Introduces Colour at the National Archives of Australia 
• Executive orders and other presidential actions from the White House  
• All the new judges at the Federal Court 
• Compass/School Bytes on the ACCC register 
• Merger of the parking apps with the ACCC's statement of issues 
• Cab Calloway performs "Minnie the Moocher" in 1931 and 1980.  
• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
• Email us at [email protected]  

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Special Counsel Amelia McKellar joins us with the latest on AI and consumer protection, from rogue chatbots to fake reviews and how regulators are combatting and using AI. Plus price-fixing on defence force estates in the ACCC's first competition law court case in a while; new and proposed laws on the merger process, social media age restrictions, privacy and ex ante digital platform regulation; and the Digital Platform Services Inquiry returns to search as the US Department of Justice proposes radical remedies for Google. All this and the green Teletubby with co-hosts Moya Dodd and Matt Rubinstein.   [Links]  

• The Three Laws of Robotics on Wikipedia 
• TVTropes on works suggested by other works 
• Press release and concise statement for ACCC v Spotless 
• G+T on the passing of the merger reform legislation and what happens next 
• G+T on the passing of the social media minimum age legislation 
• Privacy Commissioner Carly Kind on social media age restrictions 
• G+T on the new consultation on an ex ante digital competition regime  
• G+T on the 9th and final interim report of the Digital Platform Services Inquiry 
• Report of the Committee on Digital Competition Law (India) 
• Moffatt v Air Canada, the AI chatbot decision 
• G+T on the first tranche Privacy Act amendments 
• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
• New rules for the consumer data right 
• Email us at [email protected]  

Support the show: https://www.gtlaw.com.au/

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Partner Liana Witt joins us to talk about the latest in competition and consumer law enforcement and law reform. The ACCC is leaning into consumer and cost-of-living issues as a new prohibition against unfair trading practices is taking shape. Private and class actions are dominating new competition law cases, but ACCC cases currently on appeal could change the enforcement landscape dramatically.   Plus age restrictions for social media and a duty of care for digital platforms; new merger laws reach the final stretch; and Sigma and Chemist Warehouse take the W, skibidi.   All this and some confusion about US cabinet appointments with co-hosts Moya Dodd and Matt Rubinstein.  

• G+T on the passage of the merger reform legislation 
• G+T on social media age restrictions and the digital duty of care 
• The latest Rap Sheet and Shop Talk newsletters 
• G+T consultant Anne Twomey on misinformation and disinformation and the doomed MAD Bill 
• G+T on Treasury's latest consultation on unfair trading practices 
• Senator Fatima Payman on "brain rot" 
• The Straight Dope on the pompatus of love 
• Meet the Gilbert + Tobin Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation team 
• Email us at [email protected]  

Support the show: https://www.gtlaw.com.au/

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.