Aldi boss blames minimum wage for driving up the cost of groceries
Groceries: the boss of a supermarket chain whose sales leapt up by 27 per cent between December 2021 and December 2022 reckons it’s the minimum wage that’s pushing prices up.
How do you like this hypocrisy?
Giles Hurley, chief executive of Aldi in the UK and Ireland… has warned Downing Street that increases in the minimum wage will drive up food prices for shoppers.
How short-sighted, too!
He’s telling people who only want to be paid enough to afford the high cost of his groceries that it is their demand that is pushing up prices!
What a lot of hogwash. The lowest-paid people in the country cannot possible be to blame for these high costs.
And what’s the reason for this outburst? Well…
The comments come as supermarket chiefs fight back against claims the high rate of inflation is being used as a cover for making larger profits.
The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has opened an investigation into supermarkets over high food and fuel prices.
Regulators want to know whether there has been a failure in competition, forcing customers to overpay.
An investigation into the fuel market by the CMA has already found evidence of increased profit margins on petrol and diesel.
This seems likely. Instead of admitting profiteering, this fatcat has chosen to offload the blame onto people who don’t have a platform to speak in their defence.
The Morning Star offers the alternative viewpoint very well:
The chief beneficiaries of food and drink price inflation are the monopoly retailers.
Tesco, Sainsbury and Asda reaped more than £4bn profits in the last financial year. They have passed on most if not all of their cost increases to customers. But they are looking after those most in need — their shareholders.
Between them, the “big three” doled out £1.4bn in dividends in 2022, the biggest increase for seven years at Sainsbury’s, topped by the 60 per cent rise — including bonanza share buybacks — at Tesco; Asda has sent £75m to its main owners, the Qatari Investment Authority and Daniel Kretinsky.
Generous remuneration packages helped chief executives avoid a visit to the local foodbank last year: unrepentant Ken Murphy [Tesco chief executive] pocketed £4.5m, while Sainsbury’s chief executive Simon Roberts struggled by on £3m.
However, Asda chair and multimillionaire Lord Stuart Rose has declared his opposition to cost-of-living wage rises this year… for striking public-sector workers.
Let’s just see what the CMA investigation says, shall we?
Source: Minimum wage rises risk driving up the cost of groceries, says Aldi boss
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