Greens think tank proposes publicly owned supermarkets to challenge Coles-Woolworths 'duopoly'
The Greens' research institute has called for a publicly owned supermarket chain to challenge Coles and Woolworths.
The $25 billion pitch is inspired by a policy commitment by New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
Greens leader David Shoebridge says the chain could be a solution to rising food prices.
The Greens' official think tank has called for the forced sale of 200 Coles and Woolworths supermarkets to be converted into public grocers in a pitch to slash grocery bills by hundreds of dollars a month.
Almost everybody is concerned by rising food prices, according to a YouGov poll of 1,500 voters commissioned by The Green Institute.
Petrol, insurance, healthcare and housing prices were rated as concerns for nearly nine in ten people surveyed, but food and grocery bills were the key cost-of-living issue with 94 per cent rating it a concern.
Three in ten voters said their mental health had suffered due to the cost of food, and four in ten said their household's diet was less nutritious than it was a year ago, or that they had skipped meals or eaten less due to grocery costs.
The Green Institute's executive director Max Chandler-Mather said grocery prices have surged under a Coles and Woolworths "duopoly" raking in billions of dollars in profit.
According to the think tank's analysis of annual reports by the supermarket giants, Coles's supermarket earnings before tax had grown by 58 per cent since 2019, while Woolworths's had grown by 41 per cent.
Meanwhile, essential goods like cooking oils, eggs, beef and milk had risen by 45 per cent and wages had gone backwards.
Coles posted a $1.09 billion net profit for the most recent financial year, while Woolworths reported net profits of $1.14 billion.
A report by the competition watchdog last year found the pair had increased profits in recent years and had little incentive to compete on price.
It stopped short of calling those profits "excessive" and did not conclude that Coles and Woolworths held a duopoly.
Mr Chandler-Mather said a publicly owned grocer could force the supermarkets to be more competitive.
"For half the cost of a single AUKUS submarine we could establish a national network of publicly owned supermarkets that would save families thousands of dollars on their groceries," he said.
"It is abundantly clear that Coles and Woolworths are some of the most profitable supermarkets in the world, and what they have done over the last five to six years is take advantage of an inflation and cost of living crisis.
The think tank proposed a $25.1 billion investment over five years to establish 200 "Fair Go Grocers" by forcibly acquiring stores from Coles and Woolworths, as well as three distribution centres, and to construct another 424 stores and 10 distribution centres across the country.
Stores would be run effectively at cost and would be cost neutral to the budget after the first five years of investment.
The Green Institute said by avoiding the need to turn a profit the cost of essentials could be slashed by 30 per cent and grocery bills cut by hundreds of dollars a month.
"We thought the goal of Fair Go Grocers, our public supermarket, should be to reach 20 per cent of market share," Mr Chandler-Mather said.
"We think at that point that would allow Fair Go Grocers to function as an effective public competitor to drive down grocery and food prices
"We need a much larger public intervention if we are going to fix this issue."
Mr Chandler-Mather said anti-price gouging laws that began in July had done nothing to reduce grocery prices.
Greens leader David Shoebridge said the idea of a publicly-owned supermarket with cheaper food should be considered.
"When I talk to people I hear about the dread they feel heading down the supermarket aisle. The shopping trolley feels like pushing a boulder up to the check-out," Senator Shoebridge said.
"People want politics to be putting solutions on the table, not just saying it's all too hard.
"This is one of the solutions because it makes buying the essentials at the supermarket cheaper."
The Greens and Coalition both supported introducing divestiture powers last term that would allow the supermarket giants to be broken up if they were behaving uncompetitively.
Break-up powers were opposed by Labor, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese describing them as an idea from "the old Soviet Union".
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-10-06/green-institute-proposal-public-supermark...
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