Greens vow to break up supermarket duopoly, set up publicly owned 'KiwiMart' (www.rnz.co.nz)

submitted 5 days ago by rimu@piefed.social to c/politics

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The party's 'Affordable Kai' policy would also expand free school lunches and set up a publicly owned KiwiMart supermarket.

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[-] absGeekNZ 5 points 4 days ago

Maybe break up the vertical integration.

You either get to be a store or a distribution center, not both, also strip the trucking from them.

Basically letting them control the the entire industry gives them way too much power.

No need to buy the stores etc. Just do what was done to Telecom, strip out the lines business and make them sell the access to everyone.

In the case of the supermarkets; force the breakup of the distribution network. This also allows small local supermarkets to compete on price, because they get access to the same price that existing major stores have available.

How does a lettuce sell for ~$1 at the market garden and show up on shelves at above $6. It isn't just the stores, the internal costs from the distribution network are very high.

This is not a full plan, we need a full analysis of how costs are being added throughout chain from farm to supermarket, somewhere along the way big costs are being imposed.

[-] rimu@piefed.social 2 points 4 days ago

That does sound cheaper and easier!

[-] absGeekNZ 1 points 4 days ago

Much cheaper; and probably easier.

I could see the govt buying 51% of the distribution, similar to the electricity market. But full nationalization is probably not a good idea.

I don't see why govt would want to be involved in the retail side at all though. Seems like a bad idea.

[-] Ilovethebomb 4 points 5 days ago

Foodstuffs and Woolworths would be forced to sell 120 stores and two distribution centres into public ownership which would require new legislation, Swarbrick said.

This is the part of the plan I don't like. Forcing a company to sell assets just so you can compete against them is kinda rotten.

I do like the idea of a state owned supermarket though.

[-] rimu@piefed.social 7 points 5 days ago

Think of it as a compromise, compared to full nationalization.

[-] Ilovethebomb 1 points 5 days ago

See, this is why Opportunity, a party that has never been in parliament, isn't that far behind the Green party in some polls.

They start with a good idea, and then take it to the point of absurdity. Rather than just saying we will have a state owned supermarket, which is a good idea, and not really that different from the existing state owned enterprises we already have, they then say they will simply nationalise part of an existing business to get this started.

They just can't help themselves.

[-] MadPsyentist 2 points 4 days ago

The issue i have with the policy of "Have a state owned supermarket", in my eyes, is that it dosent give a how. Its just an empty promise, thats what i like about the Greens policy is that it says How they plan on doing it. I take issue with a bunch of our political parties for just releasing policy without saying HOW they will achive it. Excersise for the reader i guess?

I do like the idea of breaking up the duopoly much in a similar fasion as Telecom, that sounds a bit better than "give me your things!" As proposed by the Greens policy.

[-] rimu@piefed.social 2 points 5 days ago

I hope Opportunity get in, it'd be good to have some different voices for a change.

[-] ooo_shiny 4 points 5 days ago

I’m a long-time Green voter but I don’t like that this policy compels the selling of supermarkets. Private business should remain private business and I don’t think the current situation quite deserves a 90s-Microsoft level intervention.

I do like the idea of a nationalised supermarket. Kiwibank works well as an NZ alternative to the big Aussie banks. A state-owned supermarket with a mandate to keep margins to a certain level would be good, I think. Set up a few supermarkets in Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga and Whangarei to start and see how it goes.

[-] Ilovethebomb 1 points 3 days ago

If you're a Green voter historically, you should be looking closely at Opportunity. They're basically the competent Green party anyway.

[-] absGeekNZ 1 points 4 days ago

Kiwibank is so under capitalised; that it can only really compete in the basic services of consumer banking. Commercial banking is kinda out of reach of Kiwibank.

I would rather see the vertical integration broken up.

[-] Revolver1864@piefed.social 0 points 3 days ago

"Forcing a company to sell assets"

If the crown can force homeowners to sell, as well as force the taxpayer to sell assets, i have zero issue with companies being treated the same.

[-] Ilovethebomb 1 points 3 days ago

They have always had the ability to forcibly aquire property, but there has to be a good reason, like building infrastructure of some type. Also, they typically pay well above the market rate.

Forcibly acquiring a business as a running entity isn't the same thing.

[-] Revolver1864@piefed.social -1 points 1 day ago

Making food cheaper for all nzers isn't "good reason"?

Will they not be compensated fairly?

[-] Fizz -3 points 5 days ago

God the greens are so bad it'd actually be funny if we weren't heading towards a global recession.

The greens have no real solutions to the issues. Its always just endless hollow populism. They always come out with a dumb plan to "solve" an issue and its always just throwing way to much money at the problem. We have hundreds of pages of investigation into supermarkets. The issue isnt that they're charging to much. And if 6 billion if how much you want to allocate to the problem you can do a lot better than buying 120 supermarkets.

It should be illegal to run a campaign this slopulist. Its so ghoulish and it promotes a political race to the bottom. Politicians have to campaign on feel good simple solutions to appeal to the dumbest members of society -> our country gets worse -> More simple solutions more scapegoating -> No politician honestly campaigns on what their government intends to do. -> we get an authoritarian usurping control.

The most depressing part is knowing people will hear this and think they are cooking. At the most pivotal time in our history our only competent party will be bogged down by activists for 3 years before getting absolutely crushed by the right after they use the greens to attack labour.