Latest / Best of Business / Liam Dann: NZ Herald business editor at large on the Finance Minister's plan to boost competition in the supermarket sector

Transcript

Liam Dann: NZ Herald business editor at large on the Finance Minister's plan to boost competition in the supermarket sector · Best of Business

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from news Talks'd be follow
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: this and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio.
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: And Liam dan is the herold's business editor at large,
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: and he was listening to the whole thing, and he joins,
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: in our hell are Liam kod Andrew? What did you
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: make of it?
• 0:25
  Speaker 3: Well? I liked it. It was a good it was
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: it was a good strong language. I guess, you know,
• 0:33
  Speaker 3: the cynical journalists journalists side of me might be thinking, well,
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: it's a bit like some of the other stuff we've heard.
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: This really good language, really good sentiment. You just wonder
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: what the actual substance of it will be. So she said, well, look,
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: let's let's do a deal. We'll make treat a new
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: supermarket entrant like a VIP. We'll you know, we'll kind
• 0:54
  Speaker 3: of roll out the welcome mat. But you know, it's
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: not clear in the hard world of business what that
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: might be other than and maybe sort of smoothing the
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: regulatory path. You know, we're not we don't seem be
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: quite talking about saying well, look you can pay no
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: tax for five years or something like that. Just come
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: in and you will give you a real kickstart. So Yeah,
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: I'm not sure. I guess, you know, the devil may
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: be in the detail and perhaps you know, they can
• 1:23
  Speaker 3: pull it. If they pull this off, it'll be you know,
• 1:26
  Speaker 3: if they could get an Aldi in here before the
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: next election, that would be a coup.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: So she did kind of suggest though that if a
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: third player I wanted to come to her whether proposal,
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: she would consider it, and maybe they might come to
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: the with the proposal saying we will spend a billion
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: dollars on a supply chain, will buy one hundred and
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: forty stores, and we will do this if you give
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: us five years tax free, and she would at least
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: consider it.
• 1:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, Look, I hope that is what we're
• 1:52
  Speaker 3: talking about, you know, hope, hope that that level of
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: sort of creative thinking is what this government is sort of,
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: you know, intimating that it's going to you know, get
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: and get involved in the next over the you know,
• 2:04
  Speaker 3: really only got eighteen months until the next election. They're
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: going to have to get on with it. But you know,
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: and that's in the in the side where we say, well,
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: let's bring in a new player and that will solve
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: all our problems, and.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: Well it might or might not here's the thing. She
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: sort of hinted that she's had an unsolicited approach by
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: an unnamed third player from an unnamed country, and it
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: felt to me a little bit like she was suggesting
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: that maybe there was something concrete amongst all the waffle.
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, look, it's possible, but then you have to look
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: at the scale and you go, well, look, you know
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: up in Auckland, we've got a costco. You know, it's
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: it's but you need something at scale really to to affit.
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: Thenamic dynamic of the whole you know, supermarket or the
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: grocery store sort of competition dynamic, and one or two
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: stores probably won't do it, So you've got to have
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: a really big, serious player. So I guess, you know,
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: it's just whether one new player would really change things
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: that much it's going to help. But then the other
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: part of it is how tough the government is prepared
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: to get with the incumbents around competition. And that is
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: also a situation where it's it's kind of easy to
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: talk really tough, it's harder to actually, you know, really
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: sort of enforce things unless you're prepared to go the
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: whole hog and start breaking up monopolies, which has been
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: done in the past Telecom got broken up, you know,
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: but that would be a big call, especially from a
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: sort of a pro business government that talks about you know,
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: concerns about sending the wrong message to potential business investors
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: and that sort of thing. So, you know, I just wonder,
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: you know, for example, they're calling the bank bosses back
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: in to talk to them about giving us a better,
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: better deal, I guess, But what will the stick be exactly?
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: And we've been trying this for a good five to
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: ten years and nothing's worked so far, but you know,
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: God loves to try. Liam Dan, I thank you so
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: much for your time today.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: For more from News Talk st B, listen live on
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: air or online, and keep our shows with you wherever
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: you go with our podcasts on iHeartRadio.