JUSTIN SMITH:
Dr Andrew Leigh is the Assistant Minister for Charities, Competition, Treasury and Employment, and he’s in our Canberra studio. Dr Leigh, thanks for your time.
ANDREW LEIGH:
Real pleasure, Justin. I should say at the outset, I’m about to be called to the parliamentary Chamber, so I’m not with you for as long as I would normally like.
SMITH:
You politicians and your busy lives. No problem.
LEIGH:
Exactly.
SMITH:
Let’s get to it.
LEIGH:
It’s a treat to talk competition.
SMITH:
Thank you. Well, let’s get to it. How’s this going to work? What’s your plan?
LEIGH:
Well, this is a fast‑track process for 3 really well‑known peak consumer and small business groups. CHOICE, the Consumer Action Law Centre and the Council of Small Business. And it’ll allow them once a year to gather up complaints on the biggest issue that they’ve seen, whether that’s drip pricing, whether that’s dodgy contract terms, and take that to the competition watchdog for a fast‑track look. The competition watchdog will then have to come back within 90 days. Of course, these organisations can raise other complaints during the year, but they’ll get one fast‑tracked complaint which allows their insights to be turbocharged through the competition regulator.
SMITH:
All right. Ok. All right. So, and how do you think this is going to – that’s the process. Will it work? Will it help bring down supermarket prices? Because that’s the plan, isn’t it?
LEIGH:
Well, what we’re doing is just part of one of the many aspects of supermarket prices. We’ve got Craig Emerson, who’s just completed his report in the Food and Grocery Code of Conduct, saying that the code, which was set up as a voluntary code by the Liberals and Nationals, should be made mandatory. So, we’re doing that. We’ve funded CHOICE to do quarterly grocery price monitoring so your listeners can find the very cheapest places to shop. The first report came out last month and the next one will be out in September. And then we’ve got the competition watchdog doing a deep dive into supermarkets, looking at issues such as loyalty cards and the like. We’ve got a big, ambitious competition agenda and it’s all focused on practical, achievable measures to get the best deal for families and the best for farmers.
SMITH:
Well, is this going to have some teeth, though? I mean, if they see the wrong thing here if this process plays out as you think it is, Coles or Woolies has done the wrong thing, you know, whatever it might be, I’m not going to try and come up with a scenario because I don’t want to be unfair to them, but they do the wrong thing, this process plays out, is it going to have some teeth at the other end?
LEIGH:
Look, absolutely. One of the first things we did when we won office was to increase the penalties for anti‑competitive conduct because they were, to be honest, Justin, too low. They were being treated by some firms as a mere cost of doing business. We can’t have that. We’ve got to make sure that these penalties are sufficient to deter bad behaviour. We’re also putting in place the biggest merger shake‑up in 50 years, modernising our merger system so it’s simpler and quicker and so the competition watchdog can see all of the mergers that are happening. And we’re setting about looking at issues such as non‑compete clauses which stop workers from moving to a better job. But I don’t think there’s been another government since Federation with a more ambitious competition reform agenda than ours. We’re very keen to ensure that we turbocharge the Australian economy. Competition is good for workers, good for consumers and good for productivity, which under the Liberals languished for a decade.
SMITH:
Ok, we’ve been talking to the opposition. You mentioned the opposition there. We’re talking to them before about their plan. Which, and part of that is to introduce a supermarket commissioner. Now, I sort of went back and mentioned the war and said during the Rudd and Gillard years, there was a Petrol Commissioner that had been put in place and there was a great deal of criticism about the Petrol Commissioner, whose name completely escapes me and escapes a lot of people, because the concern was that nothing got done with a new Petrol Commissioner that was under your watch and under the Liberal party watch. And the Coalition’s watch is they want to put another layer of bureaucracy in there. Are you doing the same thing with these super complainers by putting them in? Is that just another layer?
LEIGH:
Well, we’ve got all the commissioners right now looking at supermarkets. They’re doing an intensive look at supermarkets in order to ensure that shoppers get the best deal and the interim report of the ACCC on supermarkets will be out in August. Throughout, we’re focused on straightforward, practical measures – getting the penalties up for breaches of the Food and Grocery Code of Conduct, increasing penalties for competition misconduct, making sure that we’re getting information into the hands of consumers and blocking anti‑competitive mergers. All of this is necessary, Justin, because we’ve seen over the last generation an increase in market concentration, an increase in markups, a slowdown in productivity under the Liberals. So, we really do need to get competition going again.
SMITH:
Look, you’ve been around a fair while, Andrew and I don’t mean this to sound as an insult in any way, but you’ve been around for a while. What would the supermarket and you’ve experienced in this area, what are the supermarkets thinking? When they look at your plan, they’re looking at the Liberal party plan of breaking them up. What do they think?
LEIGH:
Well, I imagine that they think they need to do a better deal by their consumers. Certainly many of them were aggrieved when we announced that we were going to put in place grocery price monitoring. We’ve already had people saying, well, ‘why do you need to do this?’ And the answer is because shoppers have a right to know where to get the very best deals. We know that they would prefer a voluntary code. We’ve given them a mandatory code. Unlike the Liberals and the Nationals who set up the Food and Grocery Code up as voluntary and then reviewed it and said it should stay voluntary. So, we’re taking on the majors in a constructive way that delivers results for shoppers and for families.
SMITH:
Well, I know you’re busy. We appreciate your time very much. Supermarkets, it’s not going to go away as a campaigning issue between now and the next election, is it?
LEIGH:
It’s a critical one. Cost of living is a crucial issue, and that’s, of course, also part of what we’re doing this week with every taxpayer getting a tax cut, the energy bill, rebates, cheaper medicines and the like. We understand people are under the pump and we’re doing all we can to deliver for Australian families.
SMITH:
Thanks very much for the chat, Dr. Leigh. Appreciate it.
LEIGH:
Thanks as always.