Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

People are being robbed at the supermarket check-out, and Labor couldn't care less—couldn't care less. Paying more than a hundred bucks for a basic grocery shop is daylight robbery, yet families around the country are being forced to do this every day. Coles and Woolworths are ripping people off at the check-out, and Labor won't do anything about it. Coles and Woolies are raking in more than a billion dollars of profit during a cost-of-living crisis, and Labor won't do anything about it. Households are being forced to choose between putting food on the table and paying the rent, and Labor won't do anything about it. Fruit, some veggies, eggs, cheese, bread, milk, even toilet paper—these should be treated as essential items, not a luxury, yet, because Coles and Woolworths keep price gouging with absolutely no consequence, they're becoming harder and harder to afford.

We need to break up the supermarket duopoly and we need to make price gouging illegal. Labor has the power to do this today but is choosing not to. No-one should have to tap their card at the check-out and worry whether they have enough money to cover the shop that day. By putting the big Coles and Woolworths supermarkets duopoly on notice that they can be broken up and by ending price gouging and making it illegal, we can bring down the cost of living and make groceries cheaper for everyone. The only thing standing in the way of that right now is the Labor Party.

This has reached crisis point in this country. Woolworths made $1.6 billion in profit in its most recent annual results. Coles made $1.1 billion in profit in its most recent annual results. And what does the Prime Minister do? He dresses himself up in a Coles vest and goes and plays Coles cosplay while everyone else is struggling to afford the groceries at the check-out and wondering whether their card is going to bounce and whether they've got enough money to pay for the basics to stay alive.

People are skipping meals in order to pay the rent and their mortgages. Rents, on average, have gone up a hundred dollars a week since this government came to power, and mortgages about double that. As a result, 3.7 million families, it's reported today, are struggling with food insecurity in this country because the massive cost-of-living pressures that are coming from everywhere are being felt by people in many places and especially at the check-out. Meanwhile, what happens? Coles and Woolies make billions of dollars in profit, and the Prime Minister embraces them and hugs them and does press conferences with them in their uniforms. Meanwhile, at that very same Coles supermarket that day, there's someone who's choosing whether or not they can put that $20-a-kilo cheese, or milk or bread into their supermarket trolley, because they're worried they're not going to have enough money to be able to afford it. Food services are telling us that they're seeing people that they've never seen before. People who've got jobs and people who've got stable accommodation are coming up and asking for help because the cost of everything is going up so much.

What is driving the inflation crisis in this country? It's not everyday people who are struggling to make ends meet and to have enough money to pay for food and to pay rent. It's the massive profiteering by these big corporations that are making record profits. The money's not finding its way to the farmers or the producers of the food. It's going straight to the owners of these big corporations who are making massive profits off the back of price gouging and profiteering in the middle of a crisis.

Labor's response to inflation is to ask everyday people to bear the cost through higher interest rates and higher rents. That is using everyday people as cannon fodder in the war on inflation, leaving the RBA to go and lift up interest rates and keep pushing them up to the point where the housing crisis breaks people. Instead, Labor keeps allowing these big corporations to profiteer, price gouge and put everyday people further into pain.

There's an alternative way of tackling this massive cost-of-living crisis that we've got, and that is to make these big corporations start paying tax, to step in and stop the price gouging—make the price gouging illegal—and to use the money that we raise from making these big corporations and billionaires pay tax to make everyday people's lives better by doing things like putting dental into Medicare or making child care free. That's how you tackle the inflation, cost-of-living and inequality crises without throwing everyday people to the wolves in the way that Labor is at the moment. But it requires guts. It means the Prime Minister has to stop donning Coles vests and, instead, take on Coles and Woolworths, make them stop price gouging and make price gouging illegal. Instead of sidling up to the big corporations and the billionaires and going to their birthday parties and their lavish anniversary functions, start making the big corporations and billionaires pay tax, and use that money to make everyday people's lives better. Use the power of government to step in and stop rents soaring to the point where no-one can afford them, stop the price gouging that's fuelling these massive profits of Coles and Woolworths, and stop the banks making billions of dollars in profits off the back of high mortgage rates that everyday people are struggling to afford. A government has to step in and stop letting these big corporations off the hook, because it is breaking people.

Housing in this country is rigged. It's no longer just a housing crisis but a housing catastrophe. Yet Labor cannot even bring themselves to say the words 'housing crisis' or 'rental crisis'. They won't help renters, they make mortgage holders pay more and more, and they give wealthy property investors an unfair advantage over first home buyers when it comes to buying a home. When 75 per cent of all Labor MPs, including the Prime Minister himself, are landlords, you understand what's going on. How's that for self-interest straight after they gave themselves a $4½-thousand-a-year tax cut? If you can't buy at the moment then you have to rent. But, with rents skyrocketing out of control, people are choosing between paying rent and putting food on the table, or they're ending up sleeping in their cars and in tents because they can't find an affordable rental. All the while, Labor gloats about a surplus. Meanwhile, back in Victoria, we've got Labor selling off land earmarked for public housing to the highest bidders—to property developers. There are 120,000 Victorians on the public housing waiting list in the midst of the worst housing crisis we've seen, yet they're lining their pockets rather than building homes for people. It is disgraceful.

Just like the classic landlord special of painting over the light fitting or the window handle to cut corners, Labor's housing plan does nothing but paint over the cracks without addressing the pressures that are causing the cracks in the first place. If you're sick of this system and you want change, you can't keep voting for the same old two parties and expecting a different result.

The Greens are fighting for renters, for mortgageholders and for people who want to buy their first home. We want to freeze rent increases, give people lower rate mortgages and make housing more affordable by ending those billions in tax breaks which load the deck in favour of wealthy property investors. We know that this won't happen overnight, but nothing changes if nothing changes. The first step is to vote for someone who will fight for you.

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