Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Finance (Senator Gallagher) to a question without notice I asked today relating to grocery prices.

Let's be abundantly clear about a couple of things. Of course, we need a mandatory code of conduct that governs the relationship between supermarket corporations and their suppliers. That's why the Greens led inquiry into supermarket pricing made a mandatory code of conduct with significant penalties one of our key recommendations. I thank all colleagues who participated in that really important inquiry for their support on that measure.

But let's be abundantly clear about something else. A code of conduct that is mandatory and governs the relationship between supermarkets and their suppliers is not going to bring down the price of food and groceries in Australia. Australians are getting smashed at the moment by what many describe as a cost-of-living crisis but is actually a cost-of-existing crisis. That's how bad it's got for so many Australians. Whether it's bank costs, food and grocery costs, transport costs, rents, power bills or interest rates, everywhere you turn at the moment Australians are getting smashed.

What is the government doing about it? Very, very little. This is a moment of choice for Labor and for Prime Minister Albanese. Are they going to back in the big supermarket corporations, with their billion-dollar profits, who are price gouging Australian shoppers or are they going to actually take a stand and support Australian shoppers who are getting price gouged? On Wednesday this week, Labor will have a test. Will they support the Greens private senator's bill to create divestiture powers in this country?

The Chair of the ACCC has made it clear that, if we had more competition in the food and grocery sector in Australia, we would have lower food and grocery prices. The problem is that the big corporations—in this case, the big supermarket corporations—have got their hooks into the political establishment. They've got their hooks into the Labor and Liberal parties. They are making billion-dollar profits by price gouging Australian shoppers, and the establishment parties in this place take their skim off the top in the form of political donations. They will then come into this place and vote overwhelmingly against the Greens' proposition to create divestiture powers. That's why Labor won't make price gouging illegal.

It is time that big corporations were not able to price-gouge Australians. We have seen fossil fuel companies, banks and supermarkets make obscene profits through a crisis period in Australia, with the pandemic and with our climate breaking down around us. They are making off like bandits, and it is ordinary Australians, through their rents, their mortgages, their power bills and their food and grocery bills at the checkout, that are paying for those obscene superprofits of the big corporations. It's got to end. We've got to make price gouging illegal, and we've got to have more competition in the food and grocery sector in this country to put downward pressure on food and grocery prices.

This is not just a moment for Prime Minister Albanese to decide whether he's going to side with the big supermarket corporations or with ordinary Australian shoppers who are being price gouged. This is a moment for Mr Albanese to decide: is he going to chase headlines or is he actually going to do something to help—something that will bring food and grocery prices down? The choice is stark. The choice is clear for Labor: are they going to back in the big supermarkets who are price gouging, or are they going to back in Australian shoppers who are being price gouged? Unfortunately, the writing's on the wall. Those political donations that are funded through the billion-dollar-plus annual profits of Coles and Woolworths are going to ensure that the political establishment does the bidding of the giant supermarket corporations. It is a disgrace, and it is Australian shoppers who are going to pay the price.

Question agreed to.