This is the first episode in the fourth series of the Fountain Court Podcast. The episode is hosted by Niamh Cleary, a barrister at Fountain Court. It is a recording of a live streamed discussion which took place in September 2023 hosted by Fountain Court, in collaboration with Thought Leaders 4. The panellists address the intersection of consumer protection and competition law. Joining Niamh in the discussion are:
David Wingfield: David has a deep understanding of antitrust economics which he combines with a comprehensive understanding of UK, American and Canadian competition laws. He is the former head of the antitrust division of the Canadian Department of Justice and currently serves as a Non-Governmental Adviser to the International Competition Network, an organisation of over 100 competition agencies from around the world that addresses competition law enforcement and policy issues. David is called to the Bar at Middle Temple, is a barrister and solicitor in Ontario and an attorney of New York State.
Daniel Carall-Green: A barrister at Fountain Court who has a wide range of expertise across commercial, competition and regulatory cases. Before being called to the Bar, Daniel was a solicitor-advocate in the competition department of Slaughter and May. His competition practice covers the full range of public and private enforcement, including collective proceedings, and his recent experience includes acting for the proposed class representative in collective proceedings against Apple regarding its commission on sales made via the App Store; acting as sole counsel for the claimant in a case about alleged exclusionary and abusive behaviour by Leeds City Council in the advertising market; and advising the Competition and Markets Authority in relation to three separate enforcement cases under the Competition Act 1998.
David Gallagher: A partner at boutique competition law firm Geradin Partners. Notable cases he advises on include a multi-billion ad tech class action filed on behalf of UK publishers against Google in the CAT and a class action filed on behalf of UK app developers against Apple. He was previously the Director of Litigation Funding at Harbour Litigation Funding and before that was Assistant Legal Director at the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA). He trained and spent the first seven years of his career at Freshfields.
Helen Ralston-Smith: Helen has 15 years of professional experience in applying economic principles to issues of strategic importance for businesses, predominantly in the context of litigation and competition investigations. Much of Helen’s work has focused on high-profile cases such as the European Commission’s investigations into foreign exchange trading and government bond trading, as well as national competition and regulatory authority investigations into parity clauses and allegations of excessive pricing.
During the session, our panel addressed trends and developments in the competition and consumer enforcement sphere and the increased integration between the two; the relationship between competition enforcement proceedings, consumer protection and class actions; whether a competition focused consumer protection regime is wide enough; potential alternatives to the status quo as well as legislative changes surrounding collective proceedings.
For more information about Fountain Court’s competition experience, please see here.
