A leading academic has questioned the commitment of the Competition Commission (CC) to wider moral guidelines, accusing it of focussing too much on low prices rather than the environment, seasonality or quality.
Professor Alan Hallsworth, special advisor to the UK Select Committee inquiry into markets, warned that if the commission continued to drive prices lower and lower, health may be put severely at risk.
Hallsworth told delegates at the World Union of Wholesale Markets' (WUWM) conference in London last week: “The Competition Commission sees itself as a supreme court and backs the supermarkets far too much. If we start driving policy with economics we will end up having to pump more and more money in.
“The commission continues to concentrate on low price, and to me that means to forget the environment, seasonality, taste and quality. It says these issues are not in its remit but it all affects DEFRA policy and the environment.”
Hallsworth was also sceptical about the body’s commitment to ensuring fair practice in the supply chain. “Its policy has been driven by one-stop shopping and people are encouraging spending through supermarkets. The market should stay at the heart of what is going on and, although they have acknowledged there’s a monopoly and supplier abuse going on, they have not taken a moral viewpoint and it is costing hundreds of thousands of pounds.”
He told FPJ: “We have had a Grocery Code of Conduct since 2000, but suppliers are too afraid to complain for fear of being delisted. The Competition Commission is not going to look through people’s books and it’s not going to consider anonymous complaints so [the proposed grocery ombudsman] is a nice idea, but it will not work.”
But WUWM general secretary Maria Cavit said it had been invited, by the commission, to contribute to an ongoing study into pricing and the importance of markets in the supply chain and urged to traders around Europe to get involved. “The minutes of our meeting with the commission were circulated to all WUWM members. We need to take some responsibility as nobody in Europe has contributed to responding to the Competition Commission - there are definitely some economists in the commission but we as markets need to take a proactive stance in addressing the situation,” said Cavit.
No comments yet