Lawyers have called for radical reform of the European Commission's merger controls along US lines after two of its decisions were overruled by a European court last week.

The Court of First Instance overturned the commission's veto of takeover by Tetra Laval, the paper packaging firm, of plastic bottling company Sidel. Earlier the court annulled an EC veto of a merger between France's Schneider Electric and rival Legrand. They were only the second and third time the EC has been overuled in its examination of more than 2,100 cases.