Has Uber breached competition law?

Asks business development partner Neil Warwick in the Sunday Times 

Sirs,

Private hire and taxi companies hoping to halt Uber’s increasing dominance of UK cities by persuading drivers to follow their US counterparts and suing the company over employment rights would be better served supporting a Competition law action being brought before the European Parliament’s Committee on Petitions (Uber Drivers: we’re being taken for a ride, Sunday Times Business, 1.11.15).

I am working with a group of private hire companies who have persuaded the European Parliament’s Committee on Petitions to consider whether Uber has breached competition and compliance in its UK operations with the challenge having been submitted this week.

UK companies are seeing Uber dominate city markets at a phenomenal rate, for example Birmingham’s next largest operator is now a fifth of the size of the app-based provider less than 10 months after Uber set up in the city. Through Competition law there may be an opportunity to better control the market.

Taxi operators and mini cab providers have spent too long trying to find a technicality to halt Uber, whilst Uber has marched unabated across the UK. Perhaps from the steps of the European Parliament we will have an opinion that could create a much more even playing field for private hire businesses whatever technology they use.

Yours faithfully,

Neil Warwick
Partner
Square One Law