ABSTRACT
The creation and protection of monopolies within the UK has been perceived as the business of State certainly for the last 700 years with competition law – in the form of price control – dating at least from Saxon times. While the word ‘monopoly’ appears not to have been coined until 1516 by Sir Thomas More, royal monopolies were granted to individuals and guilds from the thirteenth century. The panoply of intellectual property laws, Labour government nationalisations and re-organisations, and present-day Conservative emphasis upon privatisations have ensured a continuity of privilege and bring that process up to date. The declared motivation for granting such rights has an equally unbroken lineage.
