In a recent ruling, the General Court declared inadmissible an appeal in a competition case on the basis that the appeal was brought by an in-house lawyer rather than external counsel. The case, T-226/10, concerned an appeal by the Polish telecommunications regulator, UKE, against a Commission decision concerning the regulation of the national wholesale market for IP traffic exchange in Poland. UKE chose to be represented by its own in-house legal team. However, the General Court took the view that the authority could not be represented by lawyers in its employ on the grounds that they lacked the independence from UKE which an external lawyer would have with his or her client. The ruling is a blow to in-house lawyers and is expected to be appealed to the European Court of Justice.