Swinney’s price cap plan a ‘wrongheaded gimmick’ – Daily Business

John Swinney: tackling food poverty (pic: DB Media Services)

A retail leader has dubbed John Swinney’s plan to cap the price of essential food items a “wrongheaded gimmick”.

The SNP leader announced the plan to limit the cost of milk, bread and other basic needs in order to help those struggling with the cost of living.

He made the announcement at the launch of his party’s manifesto, saying it would raise nutrition levels and ease pressure on the health service.

He told Daily Business afterwards that the taxpayer would not foot the bill. “There is no cost to the public purse,” he said. However, this also means there would be no compensation offered to retailers forced to cut prices.

A retail group said a better solution would be to cut the cost of doing business. Ewan MacDonald-Russell, deputy head of the Scottish Retail Consortium, said: “Many of the costs keeping shop prices high are now arising from the muddle of new regulations and taxes coming from government policies.

“Rather than recreating 1970s-style price controls and potty gimmicks, public policy should get serious and focus on cutting retailers’ costs so that resources can be directed to keeping prices as low as possible for customers.”

Mr Swinney rejected claims from the media that his policy was against free market principles, that capping food essentials would be passed down to struggling farmers. He suggested his cap would only apply to larger stores.

“My intention would be to apply this to supermarkets who can take the financial strain,” he said.

He accepted that it would require consultation with the industry and would have to meet the requirements of the Internal Markets Act which prevents devolved nations competing unfairly.

He said it would have a “sunset clause” as it would only be implemented in limited circumstances, such as high inflation.

Scottish Conservative business and economy spokesman Murdo Fraser said: “This is another back-of-a-fag-packet plan from John Swinney that is only designed to create another SNP rammy with the UK Government.

“He’s whipping up the nationalist grievance machine in a shameless bid to pander to his supporters, when he knows fine well he doesn’t have the powers to implement this.

“People across Scotland are rightly worried about rising bills right now and deserve better than these ill-thought-out plans from the SNP.

“And at a time when our farmers and food producers are struggling to stay afloat, a price cap would be the last thing they need when selling their iconic products.”

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