ACORN Calgary calling for price cap on essential food items

A group demanding big grocery chains stop price-gouging Canadians took their message to the streets in Calgary on Saturday.

According to Food Bank Canada’s 2023 hunger count, there were about two million food bank visits across the country last year — up nearly 80 per cent since March 2019.

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) says that’s unacceptable — especially as big grocery chains pull in record profits.

The group also says food retail profits have doubled since the start of COVID, which is leading Canadians to buy lower quality and quantity of food items.

Maggy Wlodarczyk, chair of the Calgary chapter of ACORN, says they are recruiting Canadians to sign a petition to lobby the feds to do better to protect Canadians from price gouging at grocery stores.

“I find the more we get the word out the more support we end up gaining and from all demographics,” she said.

“Food is a necessity of life and it affects everybody.”

ACORN is demanding a price cap on essential food items and to tax excessive profits, with Wlodarczyk saying the group is open to discussing “what excessive is.” She says essential food items include milk, rice, grains and legumes, fresh meat, and vegetables.

Wlodarczyk says very few are immune to the high cost of groceries amid other escalating costs of day-to-day life.

“Everyone’s feeling the crunch right now if this isn’t just something that’s affecting the less fortunate,” she said.

“This is affecting people who are working, it’s affecting people who are out on the streets, it’s affecting people who are new families, it’s affecting seniors on fixed incomes.”

This comes just days after Loblaw Cos. Ltd. and its parent company, George Weston Ltd., agreed to pay $500 million to settle a class-action lawsuit regarding their involvement in an alleged bread price-fixing scheme.

Canadian politicians have also been trying to tackle grocery prices, which have risen significantly in just a few years amid overall inflation and higher interest rates.

However, experts say politicians are oversimplifying a complicated issue to look like they’re meaningfully addressing food inflation when in reality they have limited tools at their disposal to influence retail prices.

Wlodarczyk says the feds are trying to address the issue but feel they are out of touch with the struggles Canadians face.

“You know this isn’t Millennials spending too much money on avocado toast right? This is people of all demographics are being affected by this and are being forced to eat food that is expired or to not eat at all, or to choose between paying their power bill or paying for groceries.”

Wlodarczyk says ACORN will continue pushing the feds to put hard-working Canadians’ needs above lining the pockets of grocery chain giants.

Loblaw has more than 20 grocery and food brands under its banner.

With files from The Canadian Press