Editorial: Steven Miles’s Trump sledge a bad sign for campaign ahead

We had a small taste of how the state election campaign will play out over the next month with a hypocritical sledge, writes the editor.

Premier Steven Miles on Tuesday. Picture: Steve Pohlner

We had a small taste of how the state election campaign will play out over the next month yesterday when Premier Steven Miles said the LNP’s latest response to the red-hot issue of youth crime was Trump-esque.

It is not. Allowing magistrates and judges to see the full rap sheet of young adults who appear before them – rather than the current situation where their youth crime history is wiped clean at age 18 – is a plan very few would argue with, and a victory for common sense.

That the best Premier Miles could come up to criticise it was to liken the state’s Opposition Leader David Crisafulli to Donald Trump gives a hint about the tone of what we will see from a desperate Labor Party in the lead-up to October 26.

Further, for a leader who just spent over $2bn giving every single household $1000 off their power bill ahead of the election, to accuse his opposite number of being too focused on winning votes is the height of hypocrisy.

It is going to be a very long four weeks.

BUSINESS OWN WORST ENEMY

A week ago in this column we asked when did we stop backing business, arguing that political leaders at both the state and federal level must stop demonising corporate Australia.

We remain committed to that position, but Coles and Woolworths have not exactly helped themselves – accused now by the consumer watchdog of faking “discounts” by hiking prices ahead of the sales.

And so we add to our argument the obvious point: Big business has to do its part in earning the respect that its lobby – the Business Council of Australia – argues is missing in the somewhat febrile atmosphere of politicking these days.

And so to those supermarkets. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission revealed on Monday it would take both to the Federal Court to face those serious allegations of dodgy dealings in their discounting practices.

The allegations are that the two supermarket companies breached consumer law by “misleading consumers through discount pricing claims on hundreds of common supermarket items”.

The ACCC claims they would first hike the price of products by 15 per cent or more for a short time, before dropping prices to create the illusion of a discount – even though the new sales prices would be the same or higher than the regular price that had applied before the short-term price hikes, usually of just a few weeks.

The ACCC alleges 266 products at Woolworths were affected by this practice at different times across 20 months, and that at Coles it was 245 products across 15 months. The products included everything from cat food to shampoo, snacks, cereal and soft drinks.

Coles says it will defend itself. Woolworths says it “will carefully review the claims and will continue to engage with the ACCC”.

But even if the court finds Coles and Woolies haven’t broken the law – and there are lots of technicalities around retail pricing to give the companies’ lawyers plenty to work with – an enormous amount of reputational damage has already been done.

In short, no matter the court’s ultimate ruling, millions of Australians are going to feel cheated and have their worst suspicions about price-gouging supermarkets proven – at least to their own satisfaction.

The problem for Coles and Woolworths is that, even if they prove their various price adjustments were justifiable and within the law, they are going to come across as just plain sneaky.

It is reminiscent of how Qantas appeared when it tried to defend itself against ACCC allegations that it had sold tickets for 8000 “ghost flights” in 2022 by claiming it was selling customers “rights” rather than “flights”. That argument did not fly in the Federal Court, and the airline ended up having to pay a compensation amount to affected customers and a $100 million civil penalty for misleading behaviour.

When the Business Council’s president Geoff Culbert was arguing his case last week, he had the good sense to acknowledge that some of business’s poor-image problems are self-inflicted – saying: “We have scored too many own goals and we have to take responsibility for that”,

He’s right. Consider some of the dreadful corporate misbehaviour – from selling junk insurance to charging dead people bank fees – that was uncovered by the Royal Commission into the banking, superannuation and financial services industries a few years back.

More recently there has been the damning evidence and findings from the various state inquiries into casino operators Star and Crown.

Mr Culbert has a big job on his hands putting the shine back on the reputation of business in Australia.

But his central point remains just as relevant as it did last week: That “business has become a convenient scapegoat” for politicians looking to make themselves appear responsive to public concerns.

But as Mr Culbert rightly said: “A strong and successful nation is one where business respects the role of government, and government respects the role of business”.

We endorse that truth, again.

Responsibility for election comment is taken by Chris Jones, corner of Mayne Rd & Campbell St, Bowen Hills, Qld 4006. Printed and published by NEWSQUEENSLAND (ACN 009 661 778). Contact details here

Originally published as Editorial: Steven Miles’s Trump sledge a bad sign for campaign ahead