Disqualifications have been handed out to three more company directors for illegal cartel activity, taking the total to six from the Competition and Markets Authority’s (CMA) investigations into bid-rigging among fit-out firms.
All three, Clive Lucking, Aki Stamatis and Sion Davies, were directors of the Fourfront Group at the time the offences took place.
- Fit-out directors disqualified after cartel bust
- Five fit-out firms pay £7m for cover bidding offences
Lucking, the founder and CEO of Fourfront, has been disqualified for four years and nine months. Stamatis, the company chairman, has been disqualified for two years and nine months. Davies, now the managing of Area Sq Ltd, has been disqualified for one year and six months.
These latest sanctions come after three other former directors, Robb Simms-Davies, Trevor Hall and Oliver Hammond, were disqualified for periods of between two and five years in May this year.
In April, the CMA secured fines of over £7m for five fit-out firms – Fourfront, Loop, Coriolis, Third Way and Oakley – for “cover bidding” activity, colluding on bid pricing to attempt reduction in levels of competition and an increase in prices overall.
The CMA found that Lucking had contributed to 10 breaches of competition law on contracts worth over £11.9m. Stamatis had a hand in one and neglected to take steps to prevent the other nine breaches, while Sion Davies failed to stop three cases of bid rigging on contracts valued at £8.6m.
These latest disqualifications take the total secured for illegal cartel behaviour to 12 since December 2016 when the CMA began actively using this power.
In a statement, the CMA said: “It is important that company directors understand that they have a personal responsibility for ensuring that their companies comply with competition law. Failure to do so puts in question their fitness to be a director of a company.”
