2023-06-17 11:35:12
Supreme Court rejected the appeals.
On June 9, the Third Chamber of the Supreme Court in case Case No. 17,418-2021 rejected the claim appeals filed by the Transport Company Avda. Alemania-P Nuevo SA and Transportes Línea Number Two Limited Taxibuses Number Six Temuco SA, Inmobiliaria e Inversiones El Carmen Cajón, Company of Transportes Line Number Eight Padre Las Casas SA, Company of Transport of Passengers Line Nine SA and Company of Transportes Line Number Five SA against the sentence handed down by the Tribunal for the Defense of Free Competition.
It should be borne in mind that the Court for the Defense of Free Competition on December 21, 2020, accepted the request of the National Economic Prosecutor’s Office, declaring that the claimants violated the provisions of subsections 1 and 2 letter a) of article 3 of the Decree Law No. 211, having entered into an agreement to limit production in the urban public passenger transport market in the communes of Temuco and Padre Las Casas, between 2003 and 2017, condemning each of them to pay the fines indicated therein, plus the preparation and implementation of a manual or internal code of conduct in which measures are adopted to discourage any conduct contrary to free competition and avoid improper contacts with competitors.
The Supreme Court concluded that the claimants do have the status of economic agents. However, it examined whether it was proven that the cars fell on a relevant competition variable -such as limiting production- and, if its purpose is to exclude competitors, in the event that the agreement has conferred market power to the required ones. This is due to the fact that the Protocols they signed were not intended to limit production, but to take charge (with the support of the authorities) of some of the externalities produced in the communes involved in the bus and taxi collective locomotion service. buses in particular, the increase in levels of congestion and pollution of the environment and, that they would not have the ability to produce the antitrust effects that are accused.
The highest Court of Justice agrees with what is reflected in the sentence handed down by the Free Competition Tribunal, in that, given the extent of the overlapping of routes and sections between those required, in addition to the dispute to attract passengers, it is It is true that the Lines compete with each other and that the agreements had the effect of conferring market power on the required lines.
He added that the Protocols brought together all the urban public transport bus lines of Temuco and Padre de las Casas, which jointly enjoy a participation that reaches high percentages in the market, which added to conditions of entry not favorable -determined, among other things, by requirements regarding fleets and availability of terminals-, prevented the entry of new agents to the relevant market from being verified. Likewise, the Agreement Protocols established a limit to the bus fleet of each line, which, as explained, set the number of buses that each of the lines could incorporate in a period of time (the following years), a determination that had As a consequence, it was possible to restrict not only the space available during that period, but also the frequency of the buses in each one of the routes. In such a way that the Protocols did have the capacity to impose a limitation on the production of the public passenger transport service by means of buses.
#Protocols #capacity #impose #limitation #production #public #passenger #transport #service #means #buses #DOE