Subjects: government funded CHOICE reports to help Australian shoppers, ACCC inquiry into supermarkets, government’s cost‑of‑living measures, reducing inflation, reliable renewables versus risky reactors
KIERAN GILBERT:
Aldi has the cheapest prices for groceries nationwide according to a report on supermarket prices. The survey conducted by CHOICE, it found Aldi was 25 per cent cheaper compared to Coles and Woolies. Basket of the same 14 items, you can see there, totalled more than $51 at Aldi, $68 plus at Coles, and $69 up – $69.33 at Woolies. The report was commissioned by the Albanese government in response to national frustration over growing costs. Let’s bring in the Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury, Andrew Leigh. What did you make of the findings? I don’t think a lot of people would be surprised by those numbers.
ANDREW LEIGH: I think people weren’t surprised that Aldi was the cheapest, but many were surprised by the magnitude of the difference. 25 per cent is really significant. And you’ve also got non‑trivial differences between Coles and Woolworths. Woolworths is cheaper in Sydney, Coles is cheaper in Melbourne. That’s also important information for shoppers to have. Information is power, and we’re trying to put that information in the hands of consumers by funding CHOICE to do its grocery price comparisons not every 2 years but every 3 months, with the next one coming out in September. We want to make sure that shoppers have power to go down the road and get the best deal. That puts competitive pressure on a sector which has pretty high levels of market concentration compared to other countries.
GILBERT:
Every 3 months? So it’s almost done on the – well, it’s done on the same basis as CPI.
LEIGH:
It’ll be done on the same frequency as quarterly CPI. It’s shadow shopping, so the supermarkets won’t know when the shoppers are coming in and won’t know precisely which products. That’s aimed at ensuring they can’t game the system, that we have valid data that’s important for households to make a good decision to stretch that family budget further.
GILBERT:
And it’s – so it’s about giving consumers the awareness. But it puts a bit of heat on the companies, too, doesn’t it?
LEIGH:
Certainly does. We want to create a more dynamic and competitive economy. We know Australia’s market concentration has increased over the last couple of decades. Competition is great for consumers, it’s terrific for workers, it’s important for business innovation. And the lousy decade of productivity growth we saw under the former government was due, in part, I believe, to the lack of competition reform that they engaged in. We’ve got a Competition taskforce in Treasury, we’ve got the ACCC looking at supermarket prices. We’re working with states and territories on revitalising National Competition Policy. We’ve just announced the biggest shake‑up of Australia’s merger laws in half a century. We’ve got a big and serious competition agenda, and this is a key part of that.
GILBERT:
It also – you would concede, though, it doesn’t shift the major challenge that people are facing now due to that inflation question that we spoke about earlier and the dozen or so rate rises. People are hurting.
LEIGH:
They certainly are, which is why every taxpayer gets a tax cut on the 1 July, every household gets a $300 energy bill rebate. It’s why we’ve been so focused on measures such as increasing Commonwealth Rent Assistance and changing the indexation of HECS retrospectively so that $3 billion goes back into the pockets of 3 million university graduates.
GILBERT:
But it’s about getting that inflation number down. That’s the key, isn’t it?
LEIGH:
Absolutely.
GILBERT:
It’s the key for everything.
LEIGH:
It was 6 point something when we came to office and had been under the Liberals. Now, 3 point something. As you know, Kieran, it’s got to be 2 point something to be back in the Reserve Bank target band. The job isn’t done yet.
GILBERT:
I want to mention something to you. You tweeted an image of Blinky Bill with 3 eyes. It’s created quite the stir, quite a reaction, certainly from the Coalition being very critical. Phil Thompson replied to you, he’s a member for Herbert in Townsville, an army veteran. He said, ‘Do you think our submariners will develop 3 eyes by being on a nuclear‑powered submarine? Didn’t you vote in favour of AUKUS? Didn’t you vote in favour of our navy getting nuclear‑powered submarines? You’re clearly a conviction politician’, wrote Phil Thompson. What do you say to him?
LEIGH:
I’m focused on the detail, Kieran. You and I have been going forwards and backwards on policy detail for over a decade and I’d be very happy to have a discussion about the substance of Peter Dutton’s policy, but there just isn’t any. You know, we have these 7 sites nominated. Six of them, the locals have said they don’t want them. Five of them are in states with state bans against nuclear power. We’ve got no estimate of the number of gigawatts to be delivered, no estimates of the cost of the policy. The timetable, if it was even achieved, would be the fastest nuclear rollout in the world, but would still leave Australia with rolling blackouts for more than a decade. This is an excuse, not a policy.
GILBERT:
Do you think that they might have timed this well? When you look at them, I look at the polling which says two- thirds of voters aged 18 to 34 support nuclear power. They’ve done their own polling and the seats in the electorate’s concerned where the power stations are going. Apparently there, they’ve got a majority support there as well. The mining industry itself has done polling which shows upwards of 60 per cent in Chris Bowen’s own seat support nuclear power. Has the mood shifted?
LEIGH:
Well, Kieran, as the Prime Minister said to you this morning, this local polling that the Coalition’s done hasn’t been released. It’s secret polling, just as the numbers are being kept secret. But we do know what this means for Australian households. One estimate had nuclear being 8 times more expensive than reliable renewables. We’re getting on with the job of rolling out renewables across Australia, not just for the environmental benefit, but for the cost‑of‑living benefit because those renewables are reliable, backed with an interconnected grid and battery support, ensuring that Australian households aren’t paying as much for their power as they would be under Peter Dutton’s nuclear fantasy.
GILBERT:
Andrew Leigh, thanks as always. Appreciate it.
LEIGH:
Pleasure, Kieran.