John Healey warned supermarkets he will not allow them to take the public “for a ride” as the Middle East crisis pushes up the cost of living. He said he would be watching closely for any sign of shoppers being “ripped off” on essential groceries or at the petrol pump.
Writing in the Sunday Telegraph, the Chancellor vowed to crack down on “price-gouging” and said regulators have the power to “clamp down on it if it happens.” He also said he would be “hands on” to protect the public.
John Healey in the Sunday Telegraph
The warning places supermarkets under notice at a time when households are already facing higher living costs. Healey singled out two spending points that are hard to avoid: food and fuel. Those are the prices he said he would watch most closely if pressure from the Middle East crisis feeds into shops and forecourts.
The Sunday Telegraph report put the warning alongside broader cost-of-living pain linked to the Iran war. That means the risk Healey described is not limited to one product line or one chain, but to any retailer that tries to push through increases without a clear reason in wholesale costs.
Supermarket prices and regulators
Healey’s comments also set out the practical limit of his warning. He did not name a retailer or announce a specific enforcement step, but he said regulators can act if price-gouging happens. For shoppers, that means the immediate test is whether a jump at the checkout or the pump can be justified by the underlying market pressure he described.
For retailers, the message is narrower than a general cost-of-living complaint. Healey tied it to essential goods, not luxury items, and to a period of extra pressure linked to the Middle East crisis. A supermarket chain that raises prices sharply without a matching cost reason could find itself in the frame.
Middle East pressure on households
The warning also sits inside a wider front-page roundup, which means it appeared alongside other unrelated stories in the same papers. But on this issue, the point was direct: Healey said he will not allow supermarkets to exploit a moment when families are already under strain.
That leaves the next move with regulators and retailers. If shoppers see higher prices for groceries or fuel, the question is whether those rises track costs or look like the kind of “price-gouging” Healey said he would not tolerate.
