The UK’s Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has proposed referring the nation’s supermarket sector to the Competition Commission for investigation.
"There are features of the market which, when considered in the context of increased consolidation and the move by supermarkets into the convenience sector, could reasonably be suspected to distort competition and harm consumers," the OFT said.
However, in response to the development, Tesco’s group corporate and legal affairs director Lucy Neville-Rolfe said: "We look forward to the debate and a prompt and speedy conclusion which will confirm the OFT’s overall comment that consumers have benefitted from competition between supermarkets and their expansion into the convenience sector."
