EU: ECJ rules Spanish regulator in breach of EU law

The Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) ruled last week that Spanish authorities had breached the European Community’s rules in 2013, when the government created the National Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC) by merging all sector, market and competition regulators into a single agency, bringing to an early end the mandate of telecommunications regulator Bernardo Lorenzo.

The ECJ determined that the government led by Mariano Rajoy had endangered the regulator’s independence by terminating the mandate of the previous sector regulators before the new CNMC was in place.

Lorenzo, former head of telecommunications regulator CMT and whose 6-year term would have run to 2017, responded with a lawsuit denouncing his unjustified and early dismissal. The case reached the Spanish Supreme Court, which turned it over to the ECJ for a final decision.

The CNMC was created in 2013, merging all previous sector regulators into a single, multi-sector organism. The ECJ’s ruling against the CNMC, created in 2013 by merging all previous sector regulators into a single, multi-sector organism, is seen as a new warning from EU authorities to Mr. Rajoy’s government, adding to other alleged violations of EU regulations.

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