Britain's Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has referred Independent News & Media's sale of its 27 regional titles in the London area to the Competition Commission.
The sale of the titles to Archant is the first newspaper deal to be referred since the OFT got jurisdiction over newspaper mergers.
Last year, a proposed acquisition of the titles by Newsquest was abandoned following a referral to the Commission by the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry.
Independent sold three of the five London divisions to Archant in mid-December for £52 million. It subsequently agreed to sell the remaining divisions for £5 million up-front.
Archant will pay a further £5 million provided it gets regulatory approval for the deal.
Independent gave up four cents to €1.94 on the Irish Stock Exchange yesterday despite stressing that the sale of the titles to Archant was unconditional.
The OFT has expressed concerns that the acquisition of seven of the titles appeared to result in "a substantial lessening of competition" for both free and paid-for local newspapers in parts of north and east London.
The Commission is expected to report by mid-October.
Meanwhile Independent was last night accused of flouting the Sustaining Progress agreement in its approach to redundancies among clerical and back-office staff. The Dublin print group of unions claimed the company was effectively forcing staff to accept compulsory redundancy because it was impossible for most staff to work at the locations to which their jobs were being outsourced.
