Refreshing competition settings

The review (referred to in cabinet minute ECO-24-MIN-0206) also took into account recommendations from the OECD and early insights from the Independent Governance and Effectiveness Review of the Commission. Public consultation was held from December 2024 to February 2025 and revealed a number of systemic concerns.

The Government is now advancing a package of reforms aimed at strengthening New Zealand’s competition framework under the Commerce Act.

The key changes include:

• Improving the speed and clarity of the Commerce Commission’s merger review process, so businesses will benefit from quicker, clearer merger decisions.
• Making it easier and less costly for businesses to get clearance for collaboration, like coming together to tackle scams.
• Modernising the rules around new technologies, such as AI, to ensure businesses understand they remain responsible for the use of these tools.
• Ensuring that sensitive business information provided to the Commission will remain confidential, by providing a 10-year OIA exemption. 
• Strengthening the Commission’s ability to combat predatory pricing – where powerful firms deliberately undercut prices to drive out competitors, only to raise prices again once competition is eliminated.

The changes are contained in amendments to the Commerce Act that intend to be passed this Parliamentary term.

Commerce Commission governance and effectiveness review

The Government has also decided to make changes to the governance structure of the Commerce Commission, New Zealand’s competition regulator, to put it on a stronger footing for the future. This follows an independent review of the Commission’s governance and effectiveness, which was released on 13 June 2025. The independent review recommended 32 structural and operational changes to strengthen the Commission’s governance and capability.

The Commission has seen a rapid expansion of its regulatory responsibilities in recent years across many key sectors including groceries, retail payments and fuel. The Government aims to ensure the Commerce Commission is well equipped to deliver timely, high-quality decisions. The new model maintains the Commission’s statutory independence but separates regulatory decision-making from governance responsibilities.

Find out more about the governance and effectiveness review of the Commerce Commission in the following documents.

Find out more about the decisions that led to these changes by reading the following documents.