Carmichael slams Co-op proposals as ‘predatory’

Orkney and Shetland MP Alistair Carmichael. 

Alistair Carmichael has described new supermarket plans by the Co-op as “predatory”.

The isles MP has highlighted the important role played by independent shops in the isles and the support they offer local food producers.

His comments have come after 26 people fed into a consultation process run by Sandwick Community Council, which discussed the plans on Tuesday.

Concerns have been raised that new stores planned for Sandwick and Scalloway could cost impact on local jobs and businesses.

“[Shetland’s local farming trade] is, I would suggest, an exemplar for how agriculture can feed into a rural or island economy such as ours,” he said.

“Crucial to that operation, however, is the existence of a thriving network of local shops. My concern today is that it’s many of these local shops that are currently under threat.”

He said local shops were “quite clear” that their future outlook would be “bleak” if applications for the new stores were approved.

“That network of rural shops, however, is absolutely critical to food production in the Northern Isles. So, the farmers that I’ve spoken about who are now producing finished cattle for slaughter and sale in the local retail sector will struggle if that network of local shops is not there.

“One of the local shops that will be most directly affected told me last week that they reckon that they take goods from no fewer than eighty different local suppliers. These are all small and medium sized enterprises that are never going to be selling in in the same quantity to a big outlet.

“Of course the Co-op will tell you that they take from local producers, and that is true, but if you listen also to the local food producers they will tell you that the Co-op will only take their products on their terms.

“Local suppliers cannot survive on the margins that the supermarkets give them, so the existence of that network of local shops is absolutely critical to the future viability of agriculture in Orkney and Shetland.

“The Co-op does have a long tradition of being at the heart of Highland and Island communities, but the Co-op Group today is a very, very different beast. They operate, effectively, in the same predatory manner, bearing down on the suppliers in communities such as mine, as you would expect of any other supermarket.

“I do hope that they will understand the damage that they risk doing to the very delicate and complex economic ecosystem that communities such as ours rely on. Once you lose an economic ecosystem such as that, you will never easily recreate it.”