Pressure piles from Labor’s left as Downing Street considers ‘voluntary’ price caps on basic items.
Labor’s left urged leader sir Keir Starmer to “seize the initiative” and demand proper controls on the soaring price of food. Reports suggested that Downing Street is only considering a voluntary scheme for profiteering supermarkets.
What is the Scheme?
A proposed opt-in system, modeled on a similar agreement in France allows bosses to choose a limited number of items to cap. The possible move, which comes as food inflation hits an eye-watering 19.2%, compared to the pricing controls introduced by then-Tory PM Edward Heath in the 1970.
How are the Government working?
The government is working constructively with the supermarkets as to how we address the very real concerns around food inflation. The cost of living, and doing so in a way that is also very mindful to the impact on suppliers. The North East Cambridgeshire MP claimed that fears smaller business would be under “significant pressure”.
How is the food inflation rising?
The British Retail Consortium blamed the sharpest rise in food inflation for nearly half a century on the “soaring cost of energy, transport and labor, as well as higher prices paid to food manufacturers and farmers”. Tory ministers have allowed major supermarkets to get away with corporate profiteering while using their enormous purchasing power to negotiate beneficial deals with under-pressure suppliers.
Why has the demand been made?
The demand came just days after the Leeds East MP told that the government must tackle “greedflation”. Across the economy by introducing price caps on staple foods and rents. “Riping-off” water and energy companies into public ownership. Mr. Sunak’s any attempt to introduce even a limited voluntary scheme is likely to worsen a growing rebellion by Tory free-marketeers.
Magaret Thatcher, tweeted today: “no conservative government should be implementing price caps. This is fundamentally against the free market and is an attack on economic freedom.” But if the cap is not mandated then, the pricing will increase further to an unbearable level. Therefore, the left must fight for the soaring price of rise and save people from unbearable inflation.
