Government plans to encourage supermarkets to impose price caps on food staples to help with the cost of living will have no “element of compulsion”, a Cabinet minister has said. Downing Street is understood to be drawing up proposals that would seek to get retailers charging the lowest possible amount for some basic products like bread and milk.
The opt-in scheme, modelled on a similar agreement in France, would allow supermarkets to select which items they would cap, the Sunday Telegraph reported. It could mark the biggest intervention on pricing since controls introduced by Edward Heath in the 1970s, the paper reported – though No 10 stressed any scheme would be voluntary.
Asked about the proposals on the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme, Health Secretary Steve Barclay said: “My understanding is the Government is working constructively with supermarkets as to how we address the very real concerns around food inflation and the cost of living, and doing so in a way that is also very mindful to the impact on suppliers.”
