Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Hansard source

I welcomed the government's direction to the ACCC to conduct an inquiry into the Australian supermarket sector. At a time when so many businesses, primary producers and families are experiencing economic pain, we need to ensure that fairness prevails in a sector dominated by just two companies. Given the ACCC's consumer survey received more than 21,400 responses, more than any other survey previously conducted, the question of fairness was very much on notice. The survey highlighted what I am hearing on a regular basis, with families buying less food, skipping meals and experiencing emotional distress when grocery shopping. Of respondents in the lowest household income bracket of less than $499 per week after tax, 76 per cent reported spending at least 20 per cent of their post-tax income on groceries, and 28 per cent reported spending at least 40 per cent of their post-tax income on groceries. This is a national disgrace.

Amid this tragedy, we have the Reserve Bank governor on a salary of $1 million warning some Australians that they may have to sell their home in order to cope with high inflation and interest rates. We have Australians that can't feed themselves, let alone house themselves. Such advice from overpaid bureaucrats is not only insulting but demonstrates the abject disconnect between the haves and the have-nots. As grocery prices have soared 23 per cent between the March 2019 quarter and the June 2024 quarter, Australians have been forced to put fewer grocery items in the trolley, and many of those items have also shrunk. We've even coined a term for it, calling it shrinkflation. This isn't the only deception. The ACCC has commenced separate proceedings in the Federal Court against Woolworths and Coles for allegedly breaching the Australian Consumer Law by misleading consumers through discount pricing, suggesting that the Woolworths 'Prices Dropped' and Coles 'Down Down' promotion prices were higher than or the same as those of other products or the same as their previous regular prices.

This behaviour has been allowed to flourish as a consequence of the duopoly that we have. The two companies account for 67 per cent of all grocery sales, which is, with the exception of New Zealand and Norway, the highest level of supermarket and grocery concentration across 15 countries selected in the report using comparable population sizes and geography. Without drastic intervention, I don't see this dominance waning. Land banking, a practice used by the majors to create barriers to entry, remains a significant problem. Woolworths currently maintains interest in 110 sites and Coles in 42 sites. By comparison, Aldi has a mere 13 sites held for future development.

The influence of the supermarket duopoly affects consumers, producers and every touchpoint along the supply chain. Last week I met with a producer who shared abhorrent stories of unscrupulous exploitation and the deliberate and systematic abuse of the supermarkets' position as the price maker. One recent example consisted of producers seeking 40c more per unit—this is for a perishable item—than what was offered, when, incidentally, the 40c was the only profit component. Rather than negotiate, the supermarket put signs up on their shelves across many stores, advising customers that the product was not available due to weather conditions. Rather than negotiate a fair price with the farmer, they denied both the farmer and the consumer. Another example is contractors requiring suppliers to pay for the artwork on store branded products, charging each of them as much as $750 for the same artwork, which was designed in house by the supermarket for a fraction of the cost.

I'm pleased that the ACCC plans further examination of the buying power of Coles and Woolworths, but these examples identify the market power imbalance, and the need for an in-depth examination is urgent. But we also need to make sure that we carry a big stick with this, because at the moment we're not. It's quite obvious to me that Coles and Woolworths are laughing at us and are laughing at farmers every step of the way. If that very recent example does not demonstrate that, I don't know what will. I thank the member for this motion, but we absolutely need to do more in this place so we're fairer on farmers and we're fairer on consumers.

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