Page 4885 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 11 November 2009
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A number of IGA owners have contacted the opposition—and I imagine they have contacted other members of this place—to express concern, in particular, I believe, with recommendation 8 within this report. Recommendation 8, I believe, is the recommendation which does put in doubt the suitable criteria for new, full-line supermarket competition. I will directly quote from page 23 of the report:
The ACT Government endorse the above market and competition analysis approach together with the adoption of suitable eligibility criteria to identify and facilitate entry by new full line supermarket competitors.
We run the risk of this policy, instead of supporting the industry, actually hindering the industry. If that is going to happen then we on this side of the chamber will not be at all supportive. I am very grateful for the contribution that the small business men and women make to my electorate of Ginninderra and it would be a great tragedy if their efforts were in any way restricted by a policy which does restrict competition.
I spoke earlier about the comments that Graeme Samuel, the head of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, made; yet the Chief Minister earlier today said that he has a different recollection, that he does not share the same view as the ACCC chairman. So in effect we have the Chief Minister of the ACT bringing into question the integrity of the head of the ACCC. That is where we are going with this. That is what the Chief Minister has said. His recollection differs from that of the ACCC chairman, differs from the recollection as presented to a federal parliamentary inquiry. That is a pretty serious allegation. It is a pretty serious difference of opinion and one that I hope that the Chief Minister can verify. If not, it does bring into serious question his own integrity and the government’s position on this issue.
In conclusion, I will reiterate that we on this side of the chamber are very much committed to an equal, fair and open marketplace whereby, when tenders are available, it is open to all people to submit tenders so that we can make sure that we get the best possible result for consumers and for employment in the territory.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (5.37): I congratulate Mr Seselja on bringing forward this motion today. I have to say I am left a little perplexed, a bit head-scratching, by the hysterical response to this motion both in press release and in debate today by the Chief Minister. It was pretty much that the whole world is going to come to an end.
I think it is about time we actually reflected on the words that are in Mr Seselja’s motion. I reflect on paragraph 2, which is what we are calling on the government to do. We call on the government to ensure “that independent supermarket operators are not excluded from bidding for new supermarket sites in the ACT”. It seems that the world is going to come to an end and Woolies and Coles are going to take over everything because of this motion.
We also call on the government to ensure “that a competitive and transparent process is used to allocate new supermarket sites to supermarket operators in the ACT”. We are calling on the government “to report to the Legislative Assembly on the process used to allocate each new supermarket site in the ACT to supermarket operators”. How is the world going to come to an end because of that? We also call on the
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