Australian Unions have slammed the big two supermarkets for blaming their price rises on workers despite their world-beating profits, after the Albanese Government committed to outlawing price gouging.
A spokesperson for Coles claimed the federal government should “tackle the real factors driving higher grocery prices,” identifying labour costs as a key cause of price rises.
This view was backed by the Australian Retailers Association, which represents Woolworths and Coles. The Association is currently pushing the Fair Work Commission to scrap penalty rates, overtime and other entitlements for permanent staff, in exchange for a one-off 25 percent pay increase for retail workers.
If the application succeeds, individual retail workers stand to lose $5,000 a year in wages earned through penalty rates, allowances and overtime. The retail award covers 350,000 workers and indirectly sets the pay and conditions for another 690,000 workers.
The proposal would cost retail workers more than $1 billion, with the potential to impact an additional 120,000 workers in other industries, such as banking, finance, and administration, resulting in an estimated $640 million in lost wages.
Coles and Woolworths are two of the biggest employers of lower-paid workers in the country, with entry-level staff earning just above the national minimum wage.
Coles Group profits last year totaled $1.1 billion, while Woolworths Group recorded profits of more than $1.7 billion.
Last month, the ACCC inquiry confirmed that Coles and Woolworths are among the most profitable supermarket businesses globally and have increased their profit margins by raising prices.
Despite grocery prices growing at twice the rate of workers’ wages, Opposition Leader, Peter Dutton, sided with the major supermarkets and last year refused to back Labor’s legislation that would have put supermarkets on notice to improve their practices.
Quotes attributable to ACTU Secretary Sally McManus:
“It is shameless that Coles and Woolworths are wanting to blame the modest pay rises of their lower-paid workers for jacking up prices. Now, they want to cut penalty rates for these same workers.
“Coles and Woolworths lead the world with their profit margins and have shown themselves to care not one bit when their customers have been under pressure. Of course, they will oppose laws to stop price gouging. They had plenty of chances to ‘do the right thing’ and hoped they could dodge their way through it and blame everyone but their own business practices.
“The last bit of spin and deflection is to blame their own workers, whose full-time wage is around $50,000 a year. Really they should apologise and take responsibility for their decisions. We all know that even if they cut labour costs they do not pass this on to customers – how much did prices drop when they brought in automatic checkouts?”
