Major supermarkets would be broken up if found to be repeatedly price-gouging consumers, under a coalition proposal.<\/p>\n
Divestiture powers would be introduced as a method of last resort to address anti-competitive behaviour in the sector, according to plans laid out by the opposition should they win the next election.<\/p>\n
It comes after growing calls to break up the supermarket duopoly of Coles and Woolworths after price rises.<\/p>\n
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton said the divestiture powers addressed concerns from consumers and farmers about rising costs at the checkout.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe situation in Australia at the moment is that there\u2019s a massive concentration of market share within the two major companies, within Coles and Woolies,\u201d he told reporters in Canberra on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are many complaints, and validly made by consumers as well, who are worried about what it means when they go to the checkout with ever-increasing prices.\u201d<\/p>\n
The federal government has ruled out divestiture powers as a way to rein in the supermarket duopoly, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese previously warning against unintended consequences of such a move, particularly in regional areas.<\/p>\n
Dutton said safeguards would be in place to ensure jobs would not be lost if the divestiture moves went ahead.<\/p>\n
Under the proposal, a supermarket commissioner would also be established to handle complaints within the sector, which would then be passed on to the consumer watchdog.<\/p>\n
It comes as the government confirmed it would impose a mandatory code of conduct for how supermarkets treat suppliers.<\/p>\n
Under the code, fines of up to $10 million would apply for breaches.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Major supermarkets would be broken up if found to be repeatedly price-gouging consumers, under a coalition proposal. Divestiture powers would be introduced as a method of last resort to address anti-competitive behaviour in the sector, according to plans laid out by the opposition should they win the next election. It comes after growing calls to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1992,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47,69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australia","category-breaking-news"],"views":110,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4223"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4223"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4223\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4225,"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4223\/revisions\/4225"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theworldinsight.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}