PCC briefs government lawyers on upholding competition ethics
The Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) has intensified the awareness of the newly revised Code of Professional Responsibility and Accountability (CPRA) and the National Competition Policy (NCP) that aim to underscore the crucial significance of adhering to competition principles within the legal practice, particularly among government counsels.
Addressing government lawyers who recently attended orientation on revised CPRA, PCC Chairperson Michael G. Aguinaldo stressed the significance of market competition in driving economic growth and enhancing consumer welfare.
“By requiring government entities to imbibe competitive principles in the pursuit of their respective mandates, we move a step closer to ensuring that every Filipino reaps the benefits of competition,” Aguinaldo said.
The PCC is a quasi-judicial government agency mandated to promote fair market competition by guarding against anticompetitive agreements, abuse of market dominance, and anti-competitive mergers and acquisitions.
During the orientation on the CPRA, resource persons from the PCC introduced the NCP to participant-lawyers from different government agencies.
The NCP mandates state entities to integrate competition principles into their existing and prospective issuances and regulations.
The PCC also discussed its competition impact assessment (CIA) tool, which allows regulators to evaluate the impact of their policies and actions on market competition, such as impediments to trade, potential anticompetitive behavior, and limitations on consumers’ right to information and choice.
Full implementation of the NCP is among the cross-cutting strategies included in the Philippine Development Plan 2023-2028.
In the same training session, Associate Justice Maria Filomena D. Singh provided an insightful overview of the CPRA and ignited the commitment of the participant-lawyers to “start the right way”.
“We want to raise, not just the standard of lawyering, but also the perception of the public about lawyers,” she said. “That lawyering is not dirty. It doesn’t involve dishonest people. That there are professionals out there – that’s us – who still practice law ethically.”
Attending lawyers to the orientation took the new lawyer’s oath led by Justice Singh.
Launched in April 2023, the updated CPRA provides guidance for legal practitioners, including provisions addressing responsible use of social media and a renewed commitment to upholding the rule of law by promoting values like truth, justice, freedom, and equality.
Singh said the Supreme Court held a nationwide caravan and series of consultations to gather feedback on the new guide for lawyers’ conduct from legal professionals, the academe, law students, and civil service organizations.
The orientation brought together representatives from the Commission on Audit (COA), the Departments of Agriculture (DA), Information and Communications Technology (DICT), Human Settlements and Urban Development (DHSUD), Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), Anti-Red Tape Authority (ARTA) and the Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corporation (PSALM).