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Do Supermarkets Deserver To Be Let Off The Hook?
Tesco says it wants to create a nation of green consumers. Did that hold sway with the Competition Commission's latest report?
When Tesco unveiled its giant £500m green scheme recently – hot on the heels of a similar initiative from Marks & Spencer – many detected a certain serendipity of timing.
Barely a day passes without another PR stunt from one supermarket or another to show how green, healthy and cuddly to suppliers they are. Anyone would think there was a competition review on.
In the event, it proved a supermarket sweep. The Competition Commission stressed that its latest report was only its "emerging thinking", but the bookies can pay out now. After three inquiries into the supermarket industry in eight years, the score is about to be 3-0. There was nothing here to frighten Tesco or any other supermarket.
Call it a victory for common sense. Clearly, the Commission is not planning to join the absurd bandwagon of Tesco-bashers who cast the company as an evil empire. It has found no evidence that the planning system was used to gain competitive advantage, and dismissed J Sainsbury's claim that Tesco plans to exploit its land bank to grow its market share from 31% today to 45%.
True, there remain concerns about the squeeze put on farmers and local competitors, but as a whole British consumers are well served by the supermarkets.
The trouble with this report however, is that it fails to address the main grumbles about broader supermarket behaviour: the damage done to local communities, the environment, and so on. It is this "not our problem, guv" attitude that is so frustrating.
On the green issue, at least, the supermarkets deserve applause – even though their main motive in tapping the green pound is naked self-interest. Still, if they direct their immense buying power to bringing green consumerism to the mainstream, it will truly be a force for good.
It's an astonishing, wonderful conversion, though some of Sir Terry Leahy's bold commitments are riddled with contradictions and evasions. But there's a bigger contradiction that has been overlooked. Leahy tells us Tesco is looking to drive a mass movement in green consumption, but what about consuming less? Less is the one thing the supermarkets cannot sell us and, as efficiencies become harder to extract, their growth will eventually outstrip all their reductions in energy use.
We should be glad the big retailers are competing to convince us they are greener than their rivals, but we still need alternatives.
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