Jordon Steele-John (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I went to Coles in Perth to get some stuff for my lunch last week: $10.90 for a block of cheese, $4.23 for a couple of tomatoes, $3.70 for a cheap lettuce, $3.60 for literally the supermarket brand's cheapest wholemeal bread and $6 for a plain packet of butter. That is $28.43 just to make a plain sandwich—no meat, just cheese, tomatoes and lettuce.

Our community is doing it tough every day at the check-out. What is this government doing about it? Apparently, not a thing. They know what the problems are, and still they've done nothing. The government needs to break up Coles and Woolworths. These massive corporations are making millions in profits while people have to make the choice between eating and paying their exorbitant rent. One of the reasons Coles and Woolworths get away with ripping us off is that, either directly or through third parties, they have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Liberal and Labor parties in the last decade alone. Look where that has got us: $28 just to make a sandwich.

The Greens introduced two bills last year to address these issues. The first was to give the ACCC the power to break up big supermarkets, and the second was to make price gouging illegal. These bills would rein in corporate greed and reduce the cost of food at the check-out so that making a sandwich for a kid's lunchbox is a little bit more affordable, yet the two parties, bought by Coles and Woolworths, voted them down. (Time expired)