14/12/2021

The Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg announced today the appointment of Gina Cass-Gottlieb as the next chair of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, replacing Rod Sims on March 21 next year.

Gina Cass-Gottlieb is Australia’s pre-eminent competition lawyer, having been a senior and founding partner in Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation for over 25 years at Gilbert + Tobin.

The appointment is a great honour for Gina and recognises her distinguished career and contribution to competition law and policy in Australia.

Gina founded the Competition and Regulation Group at G+T in the early 1990’s. Working with others such as Peter Waters and Bill Spain, Gina attracted other leading practitioners to G+T, including Liza Carver, Luke Woodward and Elizabeth Avery and built the G+T corporate powerhouse.

Gina and the G+T team have been renowned for providing advice on the most complex and cutting-edge work over the last 20 plus years. She has advised on some of the largest, most contentious and complex merger clearance matters in Australia and New Zealand. Gina is also widely recognised as one of Australia’s leading advisors in financial services regulation and representing financial institutions and their industry associations before the ACCC, APRA, ASIC and AUSTRAC. Gina was appointed by the Commonwealth Treasurer to the Reserve Bank of Australia’s Payments System Board in 2013, re-appointed in 2018 and recently to the Financial Regulator Assessment Authority.

Managing partner Danny Gilbert said today “This appointment is an enormous tribute to both Gina and to G+T. I am very proud of Gina and the truly talented team she has built around her. As the first woman to lead a major regulatory body such as the ACCC, her appointment confirms Josh Frydenberg’s commitment to diversity and the empowerment of women in the economic leadership of Australia.

We warmly congratulate Gina and share with her the joy of her appointment”.

Competition, Consumer + Market Regulation partner Elizabeth Avery noted “Gina’s brilliance, dedication and hard work will be greatly missed. Under her guidance, she has developed the Competition and Regulation Group to be the biggest and best in the country and has been an incredible mentor to many in the G+T team. This is a wonderful appointment for Gina and the ACCC”.

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