Court pronounced legitimacy of FAS warning issued to the St Petersburg Government in the course of investigating an antimonopoly case

On 28 September 2016, Moscow Arbitration Court confirmed legitimacy of the warning of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia) issued to St Petersburg Government to terminate actions (omissions) that have elements of violating Part 1 Article 15 of the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition”.

Investigating an antimonopoly case open upon a claim of “CardioClinic” CJSC, FAS exposed elements of violations: St Petersburg Government failed to adopt measures in order to create conditions aimed at non-discriminatory distribution of medical care under the frame of the regional mandatory medical insurance programme for St Petersburg. FAS decided to issue a warning guided by the “forth antimonopoly package”.

To execute the warning, by 25 April 2016 St Petersburg Government had to devise and implement the mechanism of distributing medical care under the regional mandatory medical insurance programme that provides for the objective criteria of distributing medical care on non-discriminatory conditions.

St Petersburg Government did not voluntarily eliminate the signs of the violations suspected by the antimonopoly authority and filed a lawsuit challenging the warning at Arbitration Court. Moscow Arbitration Court, however, confirmed legitimacy and reasonableness of the position taken by the antimonopoly body.

“Liberalizing the antimonopoly law under the “forth antimonopoly package” that came into force, FAS issued a warning to St Petersburg Government. Unfortunately, the respondent did not take an advantage of the opportunity to voluntarily eliminate the signs of the violation exposed by FAS”, pointed out the Head of FAS Department for Control over Social Sphere and Trade, Timofey Nizhegorodtsev.