If the United Kingdom is to remain competitive, it needs stronger regulations that protect the country’s companies, McGuireWoods London partner Matthew Hall wrote in a May 16, 2024, commentary in The Times. “Chinese companies receive nine times more government support than their western counterparts,” he wrote. Meanwhile, “[t]he UK has beefed up its protection of the country’s companies, assets and intellectual property through the National Security and Investment Act. This includes the commission’s new powers under the EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation to review subsidies granted by non-EU countries that relate to a company’s operations inside the bloc, with the goal of protecting its economies and security. Hall urged UK ministers to “adopt and enforce more stringent regulation along the lines of the EU’s regulation to protect its industries from subsidised foreign competitors.”
