Chillin'Competition

Familiar with situations where the EC Courts find a violation of a rule of due process, but refuse to quash a Commission’s decision because, absent this infringement, the outcome of the case would not have been different?

In a very straightforward, and funny, manner, Ivo Van Bael proposed  to describe this (“unfortunate“) legal principle as the “so what doctrine” (source: “Insufficient Control of EC Competition Law Enforcement”, Fordham Corporate Law Institute, 1993, at p.742). Awesome.

A refresher now.  Ivo Van Bael was one of the most influential Brussels lawyers in the 70s and 80s. Besides being one of the founders of the law firm Van Bael and Bellis, Ivo Van Bael has been one of the strongests advocates of due process/rights of defence issues in competition cases. He has written ferocious papers  lambasting the Commission’s attitude in antitrust proceedings (with a certain sense of courage, many practitioners being now reluctant to do so, for fear of ex post retaliation against their clients).

Just wanted to pay tribute to him. This kind of straigthforward language in legal papers is unfortunately disappearing.