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Stephen Topping

Principal

Stephen Topping has over 20 years’ experience of providing economic advice to clients across a range of sectors. Before joining Europe Economics in 2004, he worked at another economics consultancy.

Stephen Topping has over 20 years’ experience of providing economic advice to clients across a range of sectors. Before joining Europe Economics in 2004, he worked at another economics consultancy.

Stephen has extensive experience advising clients on price controls and the cost of capital, with a track record in the electricity, gas, water, rail and airport sectors. He has worked on secondment within a number of regulators, including Ofwat (three times), Ofcom and Ofgem. He also has significant experience in impact assessment of public policy — for example, he has authored a handbook on the subject and conducted impact assessments for the European Commission. Stephen has wider expertise in competition economics (including competition frameworks in the utilities sectors), consumer policy and behavioural economics. He also leads Europe Economics’ work on the provision of economics training courses.

Alongside his work at Europe Economics, Stephen is an evangelical Christian preacher. He believes that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and is relying on the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ on the cross for the forgiveness of his sins.

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Critique of regulatory judgements

One form of legal case involves a challenge to regulatory decisions. We offer expert witness assistant assessing whether regulatory decisions are in line with established policy objectives or regulatory precedent and what the competition or other implications are of those decisions or alternatives.

Assessment of profitability or cost of capital

In regulated price controls, a key input is the determined cost of capital. This has often been a subject of appeals against regulatory judgements. Cost of capital analysis also feeds into assessments of profitability in assessing whether firms have been charging prices above the competitive level, and into the valuation of research pipelines in mergers.

Critique of econometric, quantitative methods or data used to support regulatory decisions

One form of a legal case is judicial revision of policy decisions. Such policy decisions are often supported by quantitative models. Those models can be critiqued in various ways – criticised or defended on the basis of their methodology or the data used.

Professional regulation

Healthcare professionals are the driving force behind the delivery of high-quality care. Outcomes can be affected by external structures and systems as well as individuals’ training and incentives. Economic regulation is one tool that can assist healthcare regulators discern between contextual, clinical and competency risks facing a healthcare profession and its workforce, and develop targeted and cost-effective regulation and training. Our work includes:
  • A seminal assessment of the risks in domiciliary social care and options for revalidation and training to address these risks for the Department of Health, in the context of the Government’s White Paper on non-medical healthcare regulation.
  • Similar assessments of the risks and options for revalidation to address these risks for the General Optical Council; the General Dental Council; and the General Chiropractic Council.
  • A cost-benefit analysis of options for continuing professional development (CPD) for the General Dental Council.
  • Cost-benefit analysis of regulation models for optical businesses for the General Optical Council.

Policy development and impact assessment

As societies and technologies change, it is vital to understand and test the value of medical innovations and new care models. Our expertise in impact assessment and wider understanding of health- and social care markets enable us to advise policy-makers and funders how to prioritise policies and interventions needed to support the delivery of health and medical care. Our work includes:

  • Assessment of the economic, social and innovation impact of Novartis UK. We also undertook as similar study for Novartis Netherlands.
  • Analysis of regulatory models of telemedicine for the General Medical Council.
  • Assessment of the value and savings attributable to Look Ahead’s integration social care and housing model.

Intellectual property and pricing

We understand the importance of protecting intellectual property in pharmaceuticals and incentivising innovation, and the need to provide cost-effective access to medicines and healthcare. We advise on the design and impact of intellectual property policies and payment and reimbursement systems within the challenges and opportunities of a European and global pharmaceuticals market, applying learning from other regulated sectors. Our work includes:

  • For Merck Sharp and Dohme, an assessment of the practice of importing patented medicines across Europe, and the implications for the market of increased transparency of prices.
  • We delivered a study to Efpia on the impacts on the EU of the exclusion of patent extension provisions, in respect of medicines, from the forthcoming EU-MERCOSUR free trade agreement.
  • We produced a report for EuropaBio on the costs to the European patented medicines sector from a change on the current SPC framework.
  • For the European Patent Office, we studied the economic effects of introducing a grace period in Europe using as the main source of information a survey of those that have filed for patent protection in Europe the US and Japan.
  • Amongst our many projects on parallel trade, we have done four major studies for the European Commission on aspects of parallel trade relating to patient safety and counterfeiting, in both the medicines and medical devices sectors.