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

Communities in Western Australia are being smashed right now. From the Kimberley to Perth to Esperance, the effects are being felt by all of us. The rising cost of living is hitting our communities harder and harder. The costs of all elements of our lives are increasing. The rising prices are forcing us to cut things we never thought we would need to think about removing from our lives, forcing us to make choices between food and rent, between being able to buy our kid a birthday present and actually experiencing a moment of joy or relaxation or care.

In talking about Western Australia, it seems the pain is most felt at the supermarket check-out, where rising costs of forcing people to cut back and go without essentials. The average Australian household is spending nearly $10,000 a year at the supermarket check-out and that is putting immense pressure on the day-to-day budgeting of many families, young people and pensioners. In 2020, 19 per cent of households expressed that food and groceries were a point of financial stress. As of 2024, that number has doubled to 40 per cent. That is 3.7 million households across this country that are worrying about how they are going to pay for food. The price increases are felt across the board, with a 31 per cent increase for oil and fats; a 25 per cent increase for breakfast cereals and bread, cheese, eggs and milk; a 15 per cent jump in the cost of poultry; and a 14 per cent rise in the price of fruit.

Now, this isn't an inevitable outcome of some uncontrollable economic factor; this is largely driven by greedy corporations and by a government unwilling to legislate any safeguards for the community. Coles and Woolworths have an unchallenged duopoly on our access to food and groceries, controlling 67 per cent of the market. These two corporations run some of the highest profit margins for the supermarket industry anywhere in the world, and they have consistently run higher profits in the last three years as the cost-of-living crisis has spiralled out of control.

A few months ago the Greens put forward the divestiture bill, which would have given the federal government the opportunity to break up the supermarket duopoly and to put real consequences on them for their anticompetitive community-harming behaviour. But the Liberals and the Labor Party have sided with the profits of Coles and Woolies. The political duopoly protects the grocery duopoly. Coles and Woolworths have price gouged customers, treated their workforces appallingly and driven suppliers like our Western Australian farmers to breaking point. Their market dominance and political donations have allowed them to get away with it. It needs to end.

If you are worried about the rising costs, you are not alone. Millions of us are being ripped off by big corporations like Coles and Woolies making massive profits. Now, you cannot keep voting for the same two parties and expect a different result. The Greens are working for cheaper groceries. If you want change, you have to vote for it. Together, let us break up the Coles and Woolworths duopoly and make groceries cheaper for those in our community.