'And, not only that, we'll get the supply chains. We'll go and we'll buy some farms and we'll get some transport and we'll do this.' The only problem was it lost money. So you might not be paying more in the shops, but you're paying more overall in your taxes. You're paying more overall.

One thing I do know—and I was on the supermarket inquiry, Senator McKim, and I know these guys aren't good guys. When you can have a company like Lidl spend half a billion dollars knowing that they don't want to compete in Australian markets, you know that it's a tough gig out there. And you think the Australian government can compete any more with these guys when the scale is there, when the logistics are there? You won't be delivering things cheaper unless you subsidise, which means higher taxes. Someone always pays. That is the problem with this. That's why increasing competition in the sector is better. That's why I stood and supported the motion for divestiture in this place—because greater competition is required in supermarkets. With less power, a lesser number of stores and less crowding out—and it's not through their contracts on their purchases; it's through their property dealings. It is when they sit on blocks of land for 20 or 30 years to crowd out the little guys, because these big supermarkets can. That is the problem. It is a market failing to maintain competition in the market.

An Australian government supermarket will not work. When you're going into retail—when you're going into markets—if the answer is government then the question is bloody stupid. We've found that so many times in this space.