Liam Quaide (Cork East, Social Democrats)

The cost-of-living crisis in Ireland can no longer be considered a transient hardship. For much of our population, it has become an entrenched form of social injustice with a vast array of adverse outcomes, both short-term and potentially far-reaching for the many people caught up in it. Nowhere is this crisis more obvious for hard-pressed families than in the weekly grocery shop, which has become a morbid ritual in witnessing ever-more stratospheric figures tot up at the counter for what is often a modest range of items.

Over the past two years, grocery prices have soared by more than 20%, hitting lower- and middle-income households hardest. The basics of everyday meals - bread, milk, pasta and fruit - have become symbols of economic strain. Tanya Ward of the Children's Rights Alliance has referred to the landslide effect of escalating costs on low-income families. Parents are skipping meals so their children can have enough of the basics. Pensioners are foregoing heating their homes. Students are choosing between food and rent. When this is contrasted with our economic prosperity, it is clear we are living in an upside-down world, politically speaking.

Meanwhile, the response from the Government has been repeated references to the Covid pandemic and the war in Ukraine and vague reassurances that competition will sort itself out. Across Europe, regulators have expressed concern that major supermarket chains are not just passing on costs, but also padding their margins. In Ireland, we are left in the dark as to how much supermarkets are making up for their own rising energy and supply costs and how much of those sums may represent an increasing profit margin.

Why is this? The reason is there is a lack of transparency on supermarket profits and pricing strategies. Aldi and Lidl, two of the biggest players, do not publish profit figures in Ireland. Dunnes Stores, which holds the largest market share, does not release any accounts. Tesco Ireland is obscured inside the wider UK group. This opacity undermines public trust. We cannot ask families to tighten their belts while billion euro retailers refuse to open their accounts. This is why the Social Democrats are calling for immediate measures to address this lack of transparency. We need the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission to be given stronger powers and the resources to conduct a full investigation into supermarket pricing and profit margins across the supply chain. The UK and France have done this and we must not be laggards.

We propose mandatory financial reporting for all major grocery retailers operating in the State, both Irish-owned and international companies, with an annual turnover in excess of €10 million. This should include country-specific profit disclosures and margin breakdowns. We urge the Government to monitor and publish regular reports on the impact of the transparency initiative on grocery price inflation and competition in the retail sector. The agrifood regulator needs to be empowered to compel the provision of necessary price and market information from agrifood businesses.

Basic grocery items are not luxuries. Ensuring transparency around pricing is a small test of whether we are serious about economic justice and addressing the cost-of-living crisis. Grocery giants cannot conduct their accounting in the shadows while families fall deeper into stress in a cost-of-living crisis that is being allowed to continue unchecked by this Government.

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