ECHR upholds ruling on state monopoly of Hungarian textbook distribution market

A panel of European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) judges on Tuesday rejected the Hungarian government's appeal against a ruling that the authorities had monopolised the country's textbook distribution market, violating companies' property rights. The case was brought by textbook distributors Konyv-Tar, Suli-Konyv and Tankonv-Ker, who argued that a single company, Konyvtarellato, had effectively monopolised the market after lawmakers centralised the management of schools in 2011 and 2012. They also argued that the new rules had given Konyvtarellato a 20 percent margin, compared with their margins of 3-5 percent, without compensating former market players.