attitudes to proposed mergers or takeovers, there is no doubt that in recent years
increasing attention has focused on anti-competitive practices and, under the
Competition Act 1980, such practices by individuals or firms – as opposed to whole
markets – could be referred to the MMC for investigation. In addition, the Act allowed
the Commission to scrutinise the work of certain public sector agencies and to consider
the efficiency and costs of the service they provided and any possible abuses of
monopoly power, and similar references could also be made in the case of public utilities
which had been privatised (e.g. under the Telecommunication Act 1984, the Gas Act
1986, the Water Industry Act 1991).