Cap. 379 Art. 17Commitments decision by the Director General.

(1)Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, the Director General may at his own discretion, instead of instituting judicial proceedings according to article 12A of this Act requesting the Court to issue a judgement declaring commitments to be binding on undertakings and, or association of undertakings pursuant to article 12C of this Act, decide to issue a commitments decision to make commitments binding on the undertaking or association of undertakings.

(2) For the purposes of sub-article (1), in an investigation initiated with a view to adopt a decision requiring that an infringement of article 5 and, or 9 of this Act and, or Article 101 and, or 102 of the TFEU be brought to an end, the Director General may, after formally or informally seeking the views of market participants, by decision make commitments offered by undertakings or associations of undertakings binding, where those commitments meet the concerns expressed by the Director General. Such a decision may be adopted for a specified period, and shall conclude that there are no longer grounds for action by the Director General: to their commitments, or where a decision referred to in this sub-article was based on incomplete, incorrect or misleading information provided by the parties.

(3) (a) Where the Director General intends to adopt a decision under this article, he shall, besides other methods that the Director General may adopt to seek the views of market participants, publish a concise summary of the case and the main contents of the commitments or of the proposed course of action.

(b) Interested third parties may submit their observations within the time-limit set by the Director General in the publication.

(c) The time-limit mentioned in paragraph (b) may not be less than one month.

(d) In the publication mentioned in paragraph (a) the Director General shall have regard to the legitimate interest of undertakings in the protection of business secrets or other confidential information.

(4) Any person, undertaking or association of undertakings concerned may contest any commitments decision adopted by the Director General by filing an application before the Court within twenty days from the date of publication of the decision on the Authority’s website: Provided that the application shall be served on the Director General and the said Director General shall file his reply thereto within twenty days from the date of service of the application.

(5) The Court may either confirm in whole or in part, or modify or quash the decision of the Director General.

(6) The Director General and any party to the proceedings before the Court who feels aggrieved by a judgement of the Court in terms of this article may appeal on points of law and, or fact to the Court of Appeal by means of an application filed in the registry of that Court, within twenty days from the date of the judgement of the Court: Provided that in case of any proceedings instituted under this article before the Court or the Court of Appeal, the Director General shall act as one of the parties to the proceedings and shall enjoy the same rights which pertain to his counter-party.

(7) Upon publication of the decision of the Director General pursuant to article 19 such decision shall, without prejudice to the rights stipulated under this article, constitute an executive title for all effects and purposes of Title VII of Part I of Book Second of the Code of Organization and Civil Procedure: Provided however that, notwithstanding the provisions of article 256(2) of the Code of Organization and Civil Procedure, the executive title referred to in this sub-article shall not be article 14 of the Malta Competition and Consumer Affairs Authority Act, for the purposes of this article the Office:

(a) shall also have the responsibility to determine and suppress restrictive practices through the issuing of a commitments decision; and

(b) with regard to the application of Articles 101 and 102 of the TFEU, shall also be designated as the competent competition authority together with the Court pursuant to Council Regulation (EC) No. 1/2003 on the implementation of the rules on competition laid down in Articles 81 and 82 of Regulation 1/2003 to adopt commitments decisions.