GEE AND KATTER STAND WITH FARMERS TO BLOW THE WHISTLE ON SUPERMARKET MARKUPS

On Thursday, 17 April, Bob Katter and I stood with local farmers out the front of Woolworths Bathurst to continue our crusade against the supermarket giants and to blow the whistle on the monstrous, unjustified mark ups of everyday fruit and vegetables.

We need to get the snouts of the supermarket giants out of the money trough. They are wallowing in world leading profits while paying our farmers a pittance and price gouging consumers on the way through. It’s shocking behaviour in a cost of living crisis.

Our Reducing Supermarket Dominance Bill would give farmers a fair go at the farm gate and consumers a better deal at the checkout.

It would level the playing field between farmers and consumers on the one hand, and the supermarket giants on the other.

Coles and Woolies are amongst the most profitable in the world. They have an 80% market share and prices have risen 24% in the last five years. These profits have been made at a huge cost to our farmers and their own customers. They’ve been making out like bandits. It’s disgraceful.

Farmers are leaving the land because they can’t make a decent return and consumers are at breaking point.

Our Bill is a gamechanger that will finally bring these price gougers to account.

Bob Katter put it bluntly, “The ACCC said in their February 2025 report said there was no evidence of price gouging despite the fact that they are among the most profitable supermarkets in the world. Well if you believe that, you believe in the tooth fairy and we will be moving for the head of the ACCC to be sacked when Parliament resumes.”

He said the rage he felt after reading the report left him with no other option but to prove farm gate prices in another part of the country were as bad as in north Queensland.

"It is clear that we set the agenda last year when we started the Parliamentary year with an enormously powerful pig suit “snouts in the trough” stunt. On that same day, Woolworths reduced the price of over 400 items of food, and we introduced the Reducing Supermarket Dominance Bill. Then, every other party announced they would be moving for divestiture."

Just proves that we led, and they followed.

Other countries like America have had anti-trust laws since the 1890s.

The Reducing Supermarket Dominance Bill in March to Parliament:

· Slashes the market power of the supermarket giants to a maximum of 20 per cent within five years.

· Limits the markups they can charge on items like fruit and veg to 100%. Currently their markup are hundreds of percent.

· Scraps the ‘food and grocery code of conduct’. It fails to address power imbalances and instead provides a mechanism by which supermarkets control suppliers and producers.

The major parties are not doing enough.

Farmers can’t keep producing food at a loss.

And families can’t keep absorbing these costs. Urgent action is needed and we are taking it.

The days of unchecked power of the supermarket giants are numbered.