Watchdog deal Housebuilders 'buying their way out' of probe

BRISTOL campaigners are outraged by a plan to allow the biggest seven housebuilders in the UK to pay their way out of a “serious” investigation.

- Tristan CORK

The proposed £100 million deal would see the Government's competition watchdog drop an investigation into allegations they breached the law by working together to share commercially sensitive information.

Six of the seven have been the leading developers in Bristol and South Gloucestershire over the past few years and are behind some of the most controversial developments in the area.

The housebuilders were accused of sharing commercially sensitive information about how they were getting on with selling their developments including everything from the agreed prices of sales, any special deals they were running, how many of their properties had been sold, reserved or cancelled and even how many people had visited show homes and sales offices, and down to what kind of buyer they were and how interested they were.

Those claims sparked a major inquiry by the Competitions and Markets Authority (CMA), the Government regulator which investigates allegations of price fixing, cartels and breaches of competition law. The firms said the offer of voluntary commitments does not mean they admit any wrongdoing.

The CMA said its investigation spanned more than two years, from January 2022 to February 2024, but now that investigation is set to be scrapped, just as it was getting going.

The CMA has announced that, instead of undertaking an investigation and mounting potential prosecutions, it has drawn up a deal, called a 'commitments package,' which would see the seven developers pay £100 million towards the Government's affordable homes fund, and sign up to pledges not to commit anti-competitive behaviours.

But environmental and housing campaigners in Bristol have expressed their fury at the proposal, and called on the CMA to scrap the deal and continue with the investigation.