公平貿易法律專業委員會 （2022年2月）

發布時間：2022-03-11　瀏覽數：1,470

聯營協議條款觸犯反壟斷法，

導致合同全部無效

2021年12月22日，最高人民法院就一起涉及駕駛培訓服務行業的橫向壟斷協議糾紛案作出判決，認定涉案聯營協議和自律公約構成橫向壟斷協議，改判確認涉案聯營協議和自律公約因違反反壟斷法規定而全部無效。固法律師將為大家介紹分析此案例。

【基本案情】

2018年9月27日，臺州市的十五家駕駛培訓機構共同簽訂《駕校合作聯營協議》（以下稱聯營協議），協議各方一致同意由各駕校共同出資組建新的駕培服務管理公司（以下簡稱聯營公司），并由該公司對路橋區范圍內的駕培行業進行統一收費、管理及分配。當日，十五家駕駛培訓機構又根據當地駕培行業費率保底實施辦法，共同簽訂《駕校自律公約》（以下稱自律公約），該自律公約主要內容包括駕校學費收費4320元、駕校返還教練員工資2520元、駕校不得給教練員辦理車輛維修、油卡、社保、旅游等。

上述十五家駕培單位簽訂聯營協議及自律公約之前，均是自主收費。2018年11月起，十五家駕培單位原先分散的輔助性服務如報名、體檢等，均由聯營公司統一處理。從2018年11月至2019年4月期間，十五家駕培單位在同一現場均設置掛牌收費臺，各自收取服務費3670元；學員還需向聯營公司繳納輔助性服務費。為避免違規，聯營公司股東會約定各駕校以3670元為基準在上下40元區間內有規律地浮動收費。2019年4月之后，十五家駕培單位各自收費在3670元上下小幅度浮動。

2019年9月10日，A公司、B公司作為聯營公司股東之一，以其余十三家駕培單位進行橫向壟斷為由向浙江省寧波市中級人民法院提起訴訟，請求確認聯營協議及自律公約全部無效。一審法院經審理僅確認聯營協議及自律公約涉及壟斷的相關條款無效，駁回原告其他訴訟請求。兩原告不服一審判決，遂提起上訴。

【二審法院觀點】

本案為橫向壟斷協議糾紛。本案二審的爭議焦點為：聯營協議中股本結構條款是否應當認定無效？

因反壟斷涉及國家整體經濟運行效率和社會公共利益，故原則上應當將反壟斷法關于禁止壟斷行為的規定作為效力性強制性規定。根據《民法典》第一百五十三條“違反法律、行政法規的效力性強制性規定的民事法律行為無效”的規定，聯營協議及自律公約中有關涉案十五家駕培單位固定收費3670元、限制15家駕培單位之間教練車輛及教練人員流動等條款屬于法律禁止的橫向壟斷協議，應認定相關條款無效。

另根據《民法典》第一百五十五條“合同部分無效，不影響其他部分效力的，其他部分仍然有效”的規定，聯營協議及自律公約中有關橫向壟斷協議條款和注冊資本與股本結構的約定基本上構成聯營協議及自律公約的主要內容乃至全部內容，認定上述條款均無效即相當于認定聯營協議及自律公約全部無效。同時考慮到本案橫向壟斷協議及其相關條款效力的認定涉及以不特定消費者利益為代表的社會公共利益，且合同效力認定屬于人民法院依職權審查處理的范疇而不必囿于當事人請求，故本院直接判決確認聯營協議及自律公約全部無效。

【結語】

本案作為行業聯營協議和自律公約中部分條款違反《反壟斷法》的規定而被全部認定為無效的典型案例，具有很強的借鑒意義。首先，反壟斷法的目的是預防和制止排除、限制競爭的行為，維護市場競爭機制，提高經濟效率，從整體上提高產品質量和降低價格，為消費者提供價廉物美的商品或者服務，使消費者獲得福利，維護社會公共利益，故原則上違反《反壟斷法》規定的條款應當被認定為無效；其次，部分條款的無效是否影響合同整體效力取決于該無效條款是否具有可分性。本案中聯營協議及自律公約中有關橫向壟斷協議條款與合同主要內容乃至全部內容不具有可分性，故認定聯營協議及自律公約全部無效。

Monopoly Terms Result in the Invalidation of the Whole Contracts

On December 22, 2021, the Supreme People's Court rendered a judgment on a case involving a dispute over a horizontal monopoly agreement involving the driving training service industry. The judgment found that the joint venture agreement and the self-discipline convention involved in the case constituted a horizontal monopoly agreement, and revised the first-instance judgment to confirm that the joint venture agreement and the self-discipline convention involved in the case were all invalid due to violations of the provisions of the Anti-Monopoly Law. PW lawyer will introduce and analyze this case.

【Case Scenario】

On September 27, 2018, fifteen driving training institutions in Taizhou jointly signed the "Driving School Cooperation and Joint Venture Agreement" (hereinafter referred to as the "Agreement"), and the parties unanimously agreed to establish a new driving training service company (hereinafter referred to as the "Company") jointly funded by each driving school, and the Company will uniformly charge, manage and distribute the local driving training industry. On the same day, the fifteen driving training institutions signed the "Driving School Self-Discipline Convention" (hereinafter referred to as the "Convention") according to the implementation measures of the local driving training industry rate guarantee. The main content of the Convention includes that driving school tuition fees shall be 4320 yuan, that driving schools shall return salary of 2520 yuan to coaches, and that driving schools are not allowed to provide vehicle maintenance, fuel cards, social security, tourism, etc. for coaches.

Before the above-mentioned the Agreement and the Convention were signed, they all charged fees on their own terms. Since November 2018, the originally scattered auxiliary services of 15 driving training units, such as registration and physical examination, have been handled by the Company. From November 2018 to April 2019, all fifteen driving training institutions set up cashiers on the same site, each charging a service fee of 3670 yuan; students also need to pay extra auxiliary service fees to the Companies. In order to avoid violations, the shareholders' meeting of the Company agreed that each driving school would regularly float charges in the range of 40 yuan based on 3670 yuan. After April 2019, the fees of each of the fifteen driving training institutions charged slightly up and down around 3670 yuan.

On September 10, 2019, Company A and Company B, as two of the shareholders of the Company, filed a lawsuit with the Intermediate People's Court of Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, on the grounds that the remaining 13 driving training institutions were engaged in horizontal monopoly, requesting confirmation that the Agreement and the Convention were all invalid. After the trial, the court of first instance only confirmed that the relevant provisions of the Agreement and the Convention involving monopoly were invalid, and rejected the plaintiff's other litigation claims. The two plaintiffs appealed against the first-instance judgment.

【View of the Second Instance Court】

This case is a dispute over a horizontal monopoly agreement. The focus of the dispute in the second instance of this case was whether the equity structure clause in the Agreement should be found invalid?

Since anti-monopoly involves the overall economic operation efficiency of the country and the social public interest, in principle, the provisions of the Anti-Monopoly Law on prohibiting monopolistic acts should be regarded as mandatory provisions on validity. According to Article 153 of the Civil Code, "Civil juristic acts that violate the mandatory provisions on the validity of laws and administrative regulations are invalid", the provisions of the Agreement and the Convention concerning the fixed fee of 3670 yuan for the fifteen driving training institutions involved in the case, restricting the flow of coaching vehicles and coaching personnel between 15 driving training units are horizontal monopoly agreements prohibited by law, and the relevant provisions should be found to be invalid.

In addition, according to Article 155 of the Civil Code, "if part of the contract is invalid without affecting the validity of the other parts, the other parts are still valid", since the provisions of the horizontal monopoly agreement and the stipulation on registered capital and equity capital structure in the Agreement and the Convention basically constitute the main contents or even all the contents of the Agreement and the Convention, finding the above terms invalid equals to finding the Agreement and the Convention both invalid. Besides, considering that the determination of the validity of the horizontal monopoly agreement and its related provisions in this case involves the social public interest represented by the interests of unspecified consumers, and the validity of the contract falls within the scope of the people's court's ex officio review without being limited to the request of the parties, the court directly ruled to confirm that the Agreement and the Convention were all invalid.

【Conclusion】

As a typical case in which some provisions of the industry joint venture agreement and the self-discipline convention violated the provisions of the Anti-Monopoly Law and were all found to be invalid, this case has strong reference significance. First of all, the purpose of the Anti-Monopoly Law is to prevent and stop the elimination and restriction of competition, maintain the market competition mechanism, improve economic efficiency, improve product quality and reduce prices as a whole, provide consumers with cheap and high-quality goods or services, enable consumers to obtain welfare, and safeguard the social public interest. Therefore, in principle, provisions violating the Anti-Monopoly Law should deem invalid; secondly, whether the invalidity of some clauses affects the overall validity of the contract depends on whether the invalid clause is separable. In this case, the terms of the horizontal monopoly agreement in the joint venture agreement and the self-regulatory convention were not separable from the main content, so it was found that the whole Agreement and Convention were all invalid.

來源：固法同行