Twenty three business representative groups have jointly urged First Minister John Swinney not to introduce a statutory cap on some food and drink prices.
The plea comes ahead of this week’s expected Programme for Government.
The joint letter was submitted to the First Minister last Thursday, 27 August. Signatories represent sectors including retail, food and drink production and manufacturing, and distribution, which together employ 300,000 people across Scotland.
The letter said:
Dear First Minister,
We share your ambition to grow the economy, improve living standards, and keep down the cost of living for Scots.
We recognise there are differing views on how best to ease the cost of living, particularly for less affluent households. However, we jointly believe the mooted Statutory Food Price Cap is unnecessary, ineffective, and likely to deliver significant adverse consequences. This is despite the assurances you have sought to provide to primary producers. The impacts upon retailers, food and drink producers, and shopworkers in themselves are undesirable but the effect will be to increase, rather than decrease, the cost of household goods.
Grocery retailers and food producers take their responsibility to provide affordable, quality food seriously. Scots benefit from western Europe’s most affordable grocery and food supply market. That is the result of retailers and the whole food supply chain in Scotland working in partnership to deliver the best food produced in the highest quality conditions at the lowest prices for consumers.
A statutory cap would not address the root causes of elevated food prices: rising production, refrigeration, and distribution costs. Supply chain shocks after Covid and conflicts in Ukraine and Iran have pushed up fertiliser, fuel, and energy costs. Taxes on employment and packaging have – as the Bank of England has pointed out - added further pressure, with costs cascading through farming, food manufacturing, refrigeration and distribution.
Instead, Scottish Ministers should withdraw the Food Price Cap proposal, let our intensely competitive food retail market continue to deliver the best prices possible, and work with retailers and the supply chain to tackle the factors which are leading to elevated prices.
That would be warmly welcomed and signal Scottish Ministers recognise the growing cumulative regulatory burden on industry.
Yours sincerely,
David Lonsdale, Director, Scottish Retail Consortium
David Thomson, Chief Executive Officer, Food and Drink Federation Scotland
Rod Addy, Director General, Provision Trade Association
Andy Bagnall, Director General, British Soft Drinks Association
Dr Judith Bryans, Chief Executive, DairyUK
James Buchan MBE, Chief Executive Officer, Scottish Seafood Association
Lesley Cameron, Chief Executive, Scottish Bakers
Dr Pete Cheema OBE, Chief Executive, Scottish Grocers’ Federation
Andrew Connon, President, National Farmers Union of Scotland
Ben Fletcher, Chief Executive, LogisticsUK
Richard Griffiths, Chief Executive, British Poultry Council
Phil Pluck, Chief Executive, Cold Chain Federation
Andrew Pyne, Chief Executive, Federation of Bakers
Kate Rowell, Chair, Quality Meat Scotland
Tavish Scott, Chief Executive, Salmon Scotland
Colin Smith, Chief Executive, Scottish Wholesale Association
Richard Smith, Managing Director, Road Haulage Association
Uthay Soundararajan, Scottish President, The Federation of Independent Retailers
Sara Thiam, Chief Executive, Prosper
Scott Walker, CEO, GB Potatoes
Scott Walker, Executive Manager, Scottish Association of Meat Wholesalers
Jim Winship, Director, British Sandwich & Food To Go Association
Ed Woodall, Chief Executive Officer, Association of Convenience Stores
