ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb has emphasised the growing challenge posed by market concentration across the Australian economy, particularly in sectors such as supermarkets, retail, essential services, aviation and digital platforms, as part of setting the ACCC’s enforcement priorities for 2025. The ACCC has also sharpened its focus on conduct that impacts both the cost of living and the cost of doing business, reiterating that “when markets are not workably competitive, Australian customers pay the price”.
Her address to the Committee for Economic Development of Australia in Sydney can be found on the ACCC website.
Key takeaways – what does this mean for your business?
2025 will be a busy year for the ACCC, with priorities spanning across competition and consumer law enforcement in addition to a comprehensive reform agenda.
The ACCC will continue to focus its efforts on concentration in the retail sector, with competition and consumer issues relating to supermarkets and the broader sector topping its list of enforcement priorities. Correspondingly, the ACCC also remains committed to addressing the cost of living – and has added the cost of doing business to its list of concerns - with many of its priorities touching on essential services and retail spending, including aviation and payment surcharges. Businesses operating in these sectors should expect to receive continued ACCC attention, with the ACCC foreshadowing investigations and enforcement action.
In addition, businesses contemplating any M&A activity in the next 12 months should educate themselves on the implications of the ACCC’s new mandatory and suspensory merger control regime, which is due to come into effect on 1 January 2026 (with the ability to voluntarily notify from 1 July 2025). The ACCC has reaffirmed that successfully implementing merger reform, promoting compliance with the new regime, and taking enforcement action will remain a priority well into 2026. See our insights on the new regime here.
2025 priorities – what’s changed?
The ACCC has carried across all of its priorities from 2024, with some refinement:
- There is only one new priority - combatting misleading surcharging practices and other add-on fees, typically associated with the surcharge on card payments and online shopping.
- 6 priorities have been expanded or refined:
- There is a further sharpened focus on the supermarket sector as the ACCC announced two sector specific priorities, with one focusing on firms with market power and conduct that impacts small businesses, and the other on misleading pricing practices.
- At the same time, the ACCC has also widened its lens to the broader retail sector with respect to the above priorities.
- The ACCC has expanded its digital economy priorities to include competition and product safety issues (in addition to the existing focus on consumer and fair trading issues).
- There has been a shift in focus from promoting competition in financial services to instead concentrating on promoting competition in telecommunications, electricity and gas.
- There is more specificity to the ACCC’s priority regarding unfair contract terms in consumer and small business contracts now targeting harmful cancellation terms, such as automatic renewals, early termination fees and non-cancellation terms.
- Following the introduction of the mandatory button battery safety standards, it is no surprise that the button battery standards remain a focus as part of a broader priority given to product safety for young children. The ACCC has also stated it will focus on raising awareness about the new infant sleep and toppling furniture standards to ensure widespread compliance.
- 5 priorities have remained largely the same: the aviation sector, consumer guarantees, consumer law compliance by NDIS providers, sustainability and misleading pricing and claims in relation to essential services.
In relation to sustainability claims, the ACCC noted its release of its final guide on sustainability collaborations and Australian competition law in December 2024, which is intended to improve businesses’ understanding of where competition risks are less likely to arise when collaborating to improve sustainability outcomes.
The ACCC’s enduring priorities remain the same as 2024, namely cartel conduct, anti-competitive conduct, product safety, scams and action to protect vulnerable and disadvantaged consumers, First Nations Australians and small businesses carrying over from last year’s priorities.
Sector specific focuses: aviation, supermarkets and retail, digital platforms
The ACCC is once again concentrating on concentrated sectors, with retail and supermarkets, essential services, aviation, and digital platforms all on the radar for 2025.
Ms Cass-Gottlieb outlined in detail the Federal Court proceedings which had been instituted, and the resolutions obtained, throughout the course of the year in each of these areas. The Chair stressed that the matters “highlight our commitment to prioritise enforcement matters in sectors of critical importance”.
These areas of focus tie in neatly with the ACCC’s new priority relating to misleading payment surcharges (in particular, those that exceed the cost of card acceptance) and other add-on costs. In 2024, the government allocated $2.1 million in new funding to the ACCC to tackle excessive card surcharging. Ms Cass-Gottlieb has said that the ACCC will focus on increasing business compliance with the excessive card payment surcharging prohibition in the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth). This follows on from the ACCC’s action against Mastercard for misuse of market power in relation to debit and credit card merchant fees, and its continuing efforts to address the sources of cost of living concerns.
Supermarkets and the retail sector
Just like last year, 2025 is expected to be a bumper year for the ACCC in the supermarkets space - Ms Cass-Gottlieb has confirmed the ACCC will conduct dedicated investigations and enforcement activities to address competition and consumer concerns in the supermarket sector in the year ahead. The ACCC will also expand its enforcement activities to the retail sector more broadly.
Following the publication of an interim report in September 2024 and a series of public hearings in November last year, the ACCC is due to provide its final report on the supermarkets inquiry to government by 28 February 2025 (next Friday). The ACCC is likely to continue to closely scrutinise this sector in 2025, paying particularly close attention to potential false or misleading pricing claims, as well as perceived imbalances of bargaining power involving suppliers.
Depending on how the upcoming election plays out, 2025 may also see the introduction of legislation enabling the court to order divestiture of assets where a supermarket or hardware business is found to have engaged in a misuse of market power in breach of section 46 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth).
Aviation
Aviation has been in the ACCC’s spotlight in the last 12 months. 2025 promises to be no different, with Ms Cass-Gottlieb confirming competition and consumer issues in the sector to be a key priority.
In October 2024, the Federal Court ordered Qantas to pay $100 million in penalties for misleading consumers in relation to cancelled flights. Just this week, the ACCC decided to authorise an integrated alliance between Virgin Australia and Qatar Airways, which would allow Virgin to use Qatar’s aircraft and crew to operate its services.
The Chair stated that the collapse of Bonza and withdrawal of Rex services from metropolitan routes in 2024 meant that Australian’s domestic aviation industry returned to a duopoly, with a detrimental impact on the rural areas they service.
In its latest Domestic Airline Competition report, published this week, the ACCC reiterated that “improved competition in the domestic airline industry is essential to ensure consumers can enjoy lower airfares, better service quality and more choice”.
Digital platforms
Competition and consumer issues relating to digital platforms are back on the priorities list in 2025. The ACCC has confirmed that the digital economy will be a key area of focus in the year ahead, “given the critical importance of digital platforms in the Australian economy, the concerning conduct [the ACCC] has observed, and the significant risks posed to competition and consumer welfare”.
This comes as Treasury consults on a proposed new Digital Competition Regime, which would impose additional obligations on “designated” digital platforms in an effort to protect and promote competition in digital platform markets. Plans are also underway for an unfair trading practices prohibition, which would be largely targeted at online trading practices which the ACCC believes have the opportunity “to influence and distort consumer decision-making”. These reforms are of course subject to any change in government come the May election.
But don’t expect the ACCC to sit on its hands until (and if) these reforms are introduced. The ACCC has already made moves in this space in 2025 - just this month, the ACCC revealed it had conducted a sweep of online shopping return policies and terms and conditions and had found some businesses using terms and conditions that may contravene the ACL. In her speech, the Chair also highlighted that the ACCC has pursued investigations of potential anticompetitive conduct in the sector, and obtained undertakings in several cases.
The ACCC is also continuing its crusade against online scams, with the newly introduced Scams Prevention Framework Bill empowering the regulator to investigate potential breaches of the framework and take enforcement action where entities do not take reasonable steps to fulfil their obligations to prevent, detect, disrupt, respond to and report scams. Businesses that do not meet their obligations under the framework can face fines up to $50 million.
Essential services
Consistently with previous years, the ACCC pointed towards its work in promoting and protecting competition across Australia’s essential services, including its continuous monitoring in the telecommunications and energy sector.
The ACCC also promoted its approval of the network sharing arrangement between Optus and TPG, which expanded coverage in rural areas.
Merger reforms – ready, set, go!
Unsurprisingly, a continuing focus for the ACCC in 2025 remains readying itself – and the business community - for the introduction of the new mandatory and suspensory merger regime on 1 January 2026 (see our insights on the new regime here).
The ACCC clearly has a huge 12 months ahead of it and is seeking to recruit an additional 80 staff in the mergers space. In her speech, the Chair noted that the ACCC expects to commence consultation on draft guidelines for the process and analytical framework of the new merger clearance regime by the end of March – this is likely to leave a very small window for stakeholders to comment upon the proposals. The ACCC is also expected to publish guidance on transitional arrangements in Q2 2025, and to engage with merger parties and stakeholders on what to expect in the lead up to 1 January 2026.
From 1 July 2025, mergers parties will be able to notify mergers under the new regime on a voluntary basis. The ACCC expects about 80% of notified mergers to be approved within 15 to 20 business days. While the ACCC has stated it will work to ensure effective implementation of, and a smooth transition to, the new regime, merger parties can expect a variety of teething issues. We anticipate that other businesses engaging with the ACCC on other, non-merger related matters may also see delays as the ACCC shifts its attention and resources to the merger reform cause.
Misuse of market power and cartels
Finally, investigation and enforcement in relation to cartels and anti-competitive conduct remains an enduring priority for the ACCC.
After a slow 2024 for cartel enforcement, the ACCC foreshadowed an increase in enforcement action in the cartel space, which may rely on more tip-offs from immunity seekers following updates to its immunity and cooperation policy for cartel conduct late last year. Ms Cass-Gottlieb referred to the ACCC’s recent action against Spotless, Ventia and a number of executives for alleged price fixing in relation to multi-billion dollar contracts with the Defence Department, and a “robust pipeline” of further investigations in this space.
The Chair also noted the ACCC’s upcoming trial in its misuse of market power proceedings against Mastercard (which is due to commence in March 2025, but may be delayed), which ties in neatly with its other priorities.
In her speech, the Chair also pointed to the success of non-litigated resolutions, and that the total fines/penalties awarded in the ACCC’s competition enforcement program exceeded $100 million – for good measure, Ms Cass-Gottlieb noted that this is the highest ever total achieved by the ACCC in a financial year for competition law breaches - paving the way for yet more litigation and enforcement action in the year ahead.
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