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David Stewart Towerhouse

David Stewart

Consultant

+44 (0) 7889 516593

David is one of the UK’s leading regulatory lawyers, returning to private practice in 2024 after serving as a senior executive at the CMA in the heart of the UK competition law and policy regime. David is a hands-on practitioner and public law litigator with strategic understanding across the full range of competition policy processes and issues, advising clients who face high-value regulatory and competition law risks.

He has a career-long focus on major regulated industries, where decisions by economic regulators, competition authorities and courts shape access to infrastructure, investment and innovation. He is particularly experienced in representing parties under investigation by regulators (or who are managing that risk), and advising on regulatory strategy and the design and implementation of regulatory remedies. He also specialises in supporting clients facing regulatory or quasi-regulatory processes involving multiple stakeholders and cross-industry capabilities or interoperability, helping clients navigate risky and complex industry transformation.

At the CMA, David was a main Board member with executive responsibility for UK merger control and the UK’s competition law ‘markets’ regimes, as well as regulatory appeals and two other CMA units, the Office for the Internal Market and the Subsidy Advice Unit. He brings direct experience of the critical processes shaping UK competition and regulation, including the CMA’s mergers and markets regimes, strategic or market-shaping interventions by major regulators, the appeals process and the impact of inter-agency bodies like the UKRN.

David’s industry experience covers all the major regulated sectors, including telecoms, energy, payments, digital platforms, civil aviation and health. He has particular experience in tech markets, in both regulated and unregulated contexts.

He has previously held roles at Ofcom (where he led the sector regulator’s enforcement function and, subsequently, its telecoms competition work), and the Australian competition authority, the ACCC, as well as senior in-house roles.