JIM CHALMERS:
One week from today, we’ll see a tax cut for every Australian taxpayer. A tax cut for every taxpayer to help with the cost of living is now just one week away. On the 1st of July, one week from today, we’ll see that tax cut for every taxpayer, we’ll see the beginning of our energy bill relief, we’ll see cheaper medicines, we’ll see a pay rise for people on awards and an extra couple of weeks of paid parental leave. The 1st of July is a really important day for the people of this country who need and deserve the cost‑of‑living relief that we have budgeted for in the Budget. One week from today, a tax cut for every Australian taxpayer to help with the cost of living.
When it comes to the cost of living, it’s also really important that we ensure that our big supermarket chains do the right thing by their suppliers and growers and by Australians at the checkout. Today we are announcing that we will implement every one of the recommendations provided to us by Craig Emerson in his really important review of the Food and Grocery Code. This is all about ensuring a fair go for farmers and families. This is all about making sure that the big supermarket chains do the right thing by their growers and their suppliers and their customers. This is all about ensuring that we make the Food and Grocery Code mandatory. We have these big penalties if the supermarket chains do the wrong thing and we’re providing more and better opportunities and avenues for people to make complaints and to have those complaints resolved if they have been treated shabbily.
This is part of a broad suite of changes that we are implementing to make our supermarkets and our economy broadly more competitive, making the Food and Grocery Code mandatory, strengthening and streamlining the mergers regime, empowering the ACCC and also funding CHOICE to ensure that there is more price transparency. Right across the board, this is all about ensuring that the supermarkets do the right thing. It’s all about ensuring a fair go for farmers and families and that’s what these changes are about.
The last issue I’ll touch on briefly is Peter Dutton’s nuclear shambles. Every time Peter Dutton or Ted O’Brien and others are asked about this nuclear shambles, it raises more questions than it answers. Peter Dutton has gone for the most divisive option. He’s divided his party and he can’t provide key details about his policy. Nuclear energy in Australia takes longer, it costs more, it will push up power bills, it will create extreme investor uncertainty and it will squander Australia’s unique and compelling advantages when it comes to our future as a renewable energy superpower. Peter Dutton wants you to believe that by building nuclear reactors in the second half of the 2030s, that he’ll bring prices down in the middle of the 2020s – that is frankly absurd. Peter Dutton’s nuclear shambles is economic insanity, pure and simple. He has gone for the option that makes the least economic sense and that will make our economy weaker and our people poorer as a consequence.
JOURNALIST:
Just on supermarkets, you said you want to make the sector more competitive. Australia still has one of the most concentrated supermarket markets in the world, 65 per cent dominance by Coles and Woolies. Is it possible to make the sector more competitive while maintaining that enormous duopoly of market concentration?
CHALMERS:
Well, what the CHOICE data showed last week is that people can find a better deal if they shop around. One of the reasons why we’re funding this price transparency is, for example, people saw how much cheaper some of these groceries were at Aldi and so we do want to make the sector as competitive as possible, recognising the structure of the sector as it stands right now. We’re doing a whole range of things to try and make the supermarket sector more competitive, whether it’s empowering the ACCC, funding CHOICE, strengthening and streamlining the mergers regime, or making the Food and Grocery Code mandatory. This is all about ensuring that we get a fair go for farmers and families. It’s all about recognising the structure of our supermarket sector in this country and trying to make sure that these big supermarket chains do the right thing by their suppliers and by their customers at the same time.
SPEAKER:
So, does that mean that any kind of divestiture powers are off the table?
CHALMERS:
Well, that’s not what Craig Emerson’s proposing in his review of the Food and Grocery Code and he goes into some of the reasons why and he also did that in his draft recommendations earlier in the year. We think this is the best way to go about it. We get a fairer go for farmers and families, and that’s really important.
SPEAKER:
Just quickly on nuclear, you touched on it before. We’ve seen, you know, government MPs sharing memes of 3 eyed fish and Blinky Bill and whatever else, you’ve seen Peter Dutton slinging personal insults at the Prime Minister in a key speech over the weekend. Are you worried voters might switch off if the tone of the debate becomes, you know, pretty crude, I suppose?
CHALMERS:
Well, I think this is the inevitable consequence of Peter Dutton going for the most divisive option when it comes to our future energy needs. He’s going for the option that makes the least economic sense but is the most divisive and we see that in his own political party which is divided on this issue and he can’t provide any of the details about what he is proposing. My focus is on the economics here. Peter Dutton’s nuclear shambles is economic insanity. That is very clear. He’s gone for the most divisive option that costs the most and takes the longest and creates the most investor uncertainty and which would turn our back on the vast economic and industrial opportunities presented by the global net zero transformation. And that’s my focus. Thanks very much.