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‘We’ll keep on pushing them,’ Champagne says. ‘This is just the beginning’
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Five grocery executives were expected at a downtown Ottawa office tower within the hour, and no one in the lobby seemed to know which door they’d come through. There was a door on Queen Street to the south, another on Sparks Street to the north, and the gathering crowd of reporters and television cameras were trying to stake out the right one.
A black SUV pulled up on Queen Street and TV crews rushed toward it, then it left.
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The executives — who lead the five companies that control 80 per cent of Canada’s grocery market: Loblaw Cos. Ltd., Sobeys’ parent Empire Co. Ltd., Metro Inc., Wal-Mart Canada Corp. and Costco Wholesale Canada Ltd. — had been called to the nation’s capital on a few days’ notice for a Sept. 18 meeting with industry minister François-Philippe Champagne and finance minister Chrystia Freeland.
The invitations went out last week, just as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gave a speech threatening new “tax measures” if the grocers couldn’t work with Champagne to stabilize rising food prices by Thanksgiving.
Ahead of the meeting, Champagne said the executives had had no choice but to show up.
“It’s not an invitation,” he said in a speech to the Liberal caucus last week. “We told them to be in Ottawa.”
Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre dismissed the exercise as political theatre, but Champagne said the meeting was part of a broader government effort to tackle food inflation, overhaul federal antitrust policy and usher in a new era of competitiveness in Canada’s concentrated grocery market.
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The meeting was scheduled for 11 a.m. Less than an hour before, Champagne’s communications team started to create a choke point in the lobby where the executives would have no choice but to walk past the cameras and tape recorders. Two staffers moved a very large potted palm tree out of the way, then set up a barrier to corral reporters. To get to the elevator leading up to the minister, each grocer would have to pass the reporters, no matter what door they used to enter the building.
“They’re going to come here, for sure,” Champagne’s spokesperson Audrey Champoux told reporters.
They came as promised, each walking by the media pen one by one. No one said much of anything. Galen Weston, outgoing president of Loblaw, and by far the most high-profile grocery executive in the country, arrived wearing a knapsack, with his general counsel beside him. He passed without answering any of the questions shouted at him.
We’ll keep on pushing them, trust me. This is just the beginning
François-Philippe Champagne
After about two hours, Champagne came out of the meeting and called it “historic” — the first time in memory that the heads of the five chains were in the same room. The day’s main accomplishment, he said, was that the grocers had agreed to work with the government to stabilize food inflation.
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“Those were difficult discussions,” he said. “This is a step in the right direction. We’ll keep on pushing them, trust me. This is just the beginning.”
While the grocers agreed to work with the government, it’s not yet clear what exactly that work will look like. Champoux said the next step is for the companies to come up with their own plans on tackling inflation and present them by Thanksgiving.
“The idea is they put forward measures that can be actionable,” she said, adding that the work will also involve food manufacturers and growers.
The Retail Council of Canada, the main lobby group representing big grocers, has been calling for the government to expand its scope beyond just grocers since the meeting was initially announced last week. The grocers have argued that inflation stems from a complex mix of geopolitical factors beyond their control, including the war in Ukraine, elevated fuel prices and global supply chain problems.
“Our members are always ready to participate in good faith dialogue about the food industry, inflation and affordability,” RCC spokesperson Michelle Wasylyshen said in an email.
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As he left the meeting, Metro chief executive Eric La Flèche said his company had seen thousands of increases from its suppliers, “and that’s why there’s inflation” in grocery stores. “We’re all committed to finding solutions to stabilize prices and bring down the CPI.”
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“Very productive meeting,” Empire chief executive Michael Medline, whose company includes Sobeys, Safeway, Foodland, IGA and FreshCo, said. “We’ve got to stabilize prices.”
After Medline left, reporters and political staffers waited in the lobby for the rest of the executives, but they didn’t come. Eventually, Champagne’s team upstairs called down to say all the grocers had left, so if they hadn’t walked past the media, they must have found another way out.
• Email: jedmiston@postmedia.com
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