Following Friday’s announcement of the findings of the Recruitment & Employment Confederation’s investigation into anti-competitive behaviour, two of the recruiters involved have contacted Recruiter.

Randstad UK Holding (Randstad) issued a statement regarding disciplinary proceedings to its subsidiary Randstad Construction, Property and Engineering (Randstad CPE). 

“The matter regards breaches of the Competition Act that took place four years prior to Randstad Group’s acquisition of Vedior in 2008 by Randstad CPE’s predecessor companies, Beresford Blake Thomas (BBT) and Hill McGlynn & Associates (HMG).

“Vedior subsidiary Select Appointments (Holdings) acted as whistleblower and advised the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) as soon as it was aware of the situation in November 2005. As a result of this approach and for their full co-operation with the OFT throughout the course of its investigation, BBT and HMG were awarded full immunity from any fine.

“In September 2009, the OFT concluded that several UK recruitment companies, including BBT and HMG, entered into a collective boycott of Parc UK, an intermediary company, and price fixing of target fee rates for the supply of candidates to intermediaries and certain construction companies. The activities of BBT and HMG were of limited effect and duration.

“Randstad CPE, and four other firms involved in the case, have received a two-year reprimand from the PSC.

“In reaching this decision, the PSC considered the work that Randstad CPE and Randstad have undertaken to put compliance measures in place and the steps taken to prevent such a matter arising again.

“Randstad takes all matters of business conduct and ethics very seriously. Our business principles, misconduct reporting procedure and competition law compliance policy are implemented throughout the group of companies.”

CDI AndersElite also issued a statement to Recruiter: “CDI AndersElite appreciates the work of the REC and supports their goals to foster the highest standards of behaviour in the recruitment profession.

“In response to the reprimand, we would like to clarify that Anders considers all matters of business conduct and ethics to be of extreme importance and any anti-competitive behaviour is a clear violation of the compliance policy to which we strictly adhere.”