Media Release

KAP Federal Leader and Member for Kennedy Bob Katter has congratulated the ACCC after WoolColes voluntarily agreed to limit discounts linked to supermarket purchases to a maximum of four cents per litre.

For 18 months the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has been investigating whether the fuel-saving offers, known as shopper dockets, from Coles and Woolworths have been decreasing competition.

“A massive congratulations to the ACCC, this is the first time in 30 years that Woolworths and Coles have been restrained.

“They have hunted with gay abandon and the buffalo are almost extinct.

“But let us not wallow in a fantasy of victory.

“This is just slowing down a remorseless destruction of family owned business in Australia,” Mr Kattersaid.

This week, the Australasian Convenience and Petroleum Markers Association cite ACCC data which indicates that 1000 independent service stations have closed in four years.

“The shopper-docket campaign was strangling the market and crushing competition.

“We have been warning Australians for years that if left unchecked the supermarket giants will spread their tentacles into all aspects of retail, trampling and decimating competition and then they will be free to charge every-day Australians whatever they wanted for bread, milk, hardware, liquor, fuel etc.

“There is no other country on earth, which would enable two chains to control close to 90 per cent of the food market in the country.

“This is the first time that WoolColes has been slayed down,” Mr Katter said.

Earlier this year, Mr Katter introduced laws to Parliament to qualitatively reduce the stranglehold of the supermarket giants on Australia’s grocery retailing and food production; this would reduce the market share of all retailing giants to a maximum of 20 per cent each year within six years, with a Food Retailing Commissioner ensuring compliance.