Veolia says addressing UK competition concerns over Suez deal

LONDON (Reuters) -French water and waste business Veolia said on Thursday it was well on the way to addressing UK concerns over its merger with rival Suez, after Britain’s competition watchdog ordered it to sell three parts of the combined UK business.

Britain’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said its decision would “protect councils and businesses from likely higher prices and lower-quality services.”

Suez’s UK waste management services business, Suez’s UK industrial water operation business and Veolia’s European mobile water services business must all be sold to buyers approved by the CMA, it said.

“We will now work with Veolia to ensure that appropriate buyers are found so that business, councils – and ultimately taxpayers – will not lose out,” Stuart McIntosh, chair of the CMA inquiry group, said.

However, a Veolia spokesperson said the company had already agreed a deal to sell the Suez waste business to Macquarie, and had agreed to sell its European mobile water services business to France’s Saur.

She added Suez’s UK industrial water operation business had a relatively small annual revenue and was therefore not significant for completion of the deal.

Veolia and Suez’s 13 billion euro ($13 billion) tie-up won approval from the European Union in December, after a months-long legal dispute, and the deal closed in January.

Global players in waste and water management, Veolia and Suez generated approximately 2 billion pounds and 1 billion pounds in the UK respectively in 2020 – roughly 10% and 7% of their annual global revenues, the CMA said.

Earlier this month, Veolia confirmed it would sell Suez’s UK waste business to Australia’s Macquarie Group Ltd for around 2.4 billion euros ($2.4 billion).

($1 = 1.0001 euros)

($1 = 0.8440 pounds)

(Reporting by Elizabeth Howcroft and Geert De ClercqEditing by Sinead Cruise and Mark Potter)