Antitrust in North America has been neglected in much of the past century. Within grocery in Canada, Loblaws, Sobeys, and Metro own all but small independent grocers and much of the vertical space needed to supply them.

This situation has resulted in rising prices and consumer exploitation. Some of the supply chain issues from the pandemic have been fully resolved, and costs returned closer to pre-pandemic times. Despite this, in some cases including dietary staples, prices remain 25-100% higher than pre-pandemic times. These profits are not going to the workers either, instead being given to the shareholders, effectively robbing our communities of the ability to afford healthy food.

Coupled with the housing crisis, Canadians are being squeezed to the point where some parents are going to work without food in order to feed their children, and even becoming homeless.

Who are the shareholders though?

In the case of Loblaws, it is the Weston family, controlling 47% of the company. In order to have a controlling share, the family would only need to engage in a political marriage with someone who owns 4% of the company. This level of control over such a massive percentage of the grocery supply chain means that a single family has the power to dictate who can afford to eat and who cannot.

Similar stories exist across the entire Canadian economy.

A Solution?

Anticompetition laws being more strongly applied. We only need to look as far as the case of Standard Oil in the US, and its breakup, to understand how breaking up grocery and other oligopolies in Canada could benefit consumers.

Breaking up these oligopolies could help revitalize the productive parts of the Canadian economies by helping to end harmful and leeching behaviours.

Given the above, we wish to ask the Government of Canada to order the breakup of Loblaws and other major oligopolies in the Canadian economy, to help ease the pressures on Canadian consumers. We also seek to ask the Government of Canada to more aggressively stop anticompetitive practices.

We seek that Loblaws, Metro, and Sobeys be broken into one company per brand at each level of the supply chain. As an example, No Frills, Zehrs, Loblaws, Atlantic Superstore, Maxi, Provigo Le Marche, Valu-Mart, Wholesale Club, and Your Independent Grocer would all become separate companies with separate ownership, and the Weston family forced to sell shares in all but one of the resultant companies. In this breakup, limits on what individual owners are allowed to own in the resulting companies should be established to prevent price fixing.