THE POLICE DEPARTMENT OBLIGATED TO AMEND THE PROVISIONS OF THE ORDERS

Having assessed the findings of the investigation performed in accordance with the application of UAB Falck Security and heard the explanations of the interested persons in the context of all factors and circumstances related to the issue, the Competition Council passed the resolution on the issue examined. Based on the conclusion that certain provisions of the Order of the Commissar-General of the Lithuanian police forces were contradicting the requirements of the Law on Competition the Competition Council obligated the Police Department under the Ministry of the Interior within a three months time limit to amend the provisions of he Order and bring them into compliance with the requirements of Article 4 of the Law on Competition. The Competition Council will have to be notified of the amendments in the provisions of the Orders whereby the police institutions are allowed to provide, on contract basis, the natural and legal persons‘ property security services.

Article 4 of the Law on Competition obligates the public and local authorities to ensure the freedom of fair competition. Such institutions are prohibited from adopting legal acts or other decisions which grant privileges to or discriminate against any individual undertakings or their groups and which bring about or may bring about differences in the conditions of competition for competitors in the relevant market. The objective of the investigation was to examine whether the rights and additional powers, including the right to use the special measures, of the special security units of the Lithuanian police granted thereto by provisions of the relevant regulations are capable of granting to them some competitive advantage as compared to other undertakings operating in the market for the security services.

The investigation concluded that according to the Orders of the Commissar-General of the Lithuanian police, the officers of the security divisions of the police department engaged in the personal and property security activity maintain all the special rights granted thereto by virtue of the Law on Police Activities. In accordance with the Law on Personal and Property Security other security services engaged in the same activity in the relevant market do not have such rights. Therefore the officers of the Lithuanian police security services are placed in an advantageous position as compared to the employees of other security services. While competing with other security services in the market for the personal and property security, the security divisions of the Lithuanian police forces enjoy more extensive rights, such as the possibility to use the special police vehicles (cars with lights giving the priority on the road); the authority to enter residential and non-residential premises owned by natural and legal persons, stop the vehicles and have access to them, etc. Meanwhile other security services do not enjoy such rights. It has been concluded that the circumstances established in the course of the investigation in addition to other factors affect the quality of the service. As a result, the security divisions of the Lithuania police forces and other security services, operating in the market for commercial personal and property security act in different competitive conditions.