Big retailers ‘using strong-arm tactics’

SOME of the major retailers are using strong-arm tactics to impose unfair conditions on suppliers.

They are also demanding hello money and enjoy margins that are three times higher than they get in other markets, according to a new report by the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Enterprise, Trade and Employment.

Called the Supplier-Retailers Relationships in the Irish Grocery Market, the report identifies serious irregularities within the market that the Government must act to eliminate, it said. “A code of practice should be introduced in the retail sectors to ensure transparency, fairness and equality” in the sector without delay, it said. It found many suppliers had been subjected to practices by retailers that included “unreasonable demands for financial contributions being made with implied threats for non-compliance”.