Businesses think Europe’s trustbusters should be kept on a tighter leash

IT WAS probably with some relief that Joaquin Almunia took up his post as the European Union’s competition commissioner earlier this month. One of his main tasks in his previous job, as commissioner for monetary affairs, was to police the public finances of the countries that use the euro. But he lacked any means to sanction the fiscally lax, such as Greece. That left a mess that his successor is now struggling to clean up.

In his new job Mr Almunia may have the opposite problem: too much power. He has the authority to block mergers, to force companies to sell assets and to fine heavily firms judged to have thwarted fair competition. There is only limited redress for businesses that feel they have been punished unfairly. All this has prompted a growing fuss about how his agency treats companies it accuses of taking part in cartels or of trying to maintain monopolies by freezing out smaller rivals. The commission, competition lawyers complain, acts as prosecutor, judge and jury. …