Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Corporate cheat Visy punished

After years of denying it Richard Pratt agrees that his firm Visy systematically cheated consumers by colluding with Amcor to restrict competition. Recall that Amcor was a co-conspirator but was exempted from legal actions because it acted as a whistleblower. For a time Visy tried the defence that they were not really colluding but just taking Amcor for a ride - Visy wasn’t interested in restricting competition it just wanted Amcor’s customers and Amcor’s claims were delusional. This is a fascinating case with regulators exploiting ‘prisoner’s dilemma’ characteristics of collusive agreements and with the ACCC securing a fantastic victory for Australian consumers – well done. Anyone looking for a great PhD topic?

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