Food price cap gimmick is the SNP’s ‘jumping the shark’ moment

The term “jumping the shark” describes the point at which a TV show or a trend hits a point of decline, when its creators resort to an absurd twist because they have run out of good ideas. It originates from a TV series from my youth, Happy Days, when Fonzie jumped over a shark in water skis, signifying to critics that the writers’ creativity had entirely dried up.

Similar thoughts must have entered the minds of many observers when watching the unveiling of the SNP manifesto for the Holyrood elections last week. In fairness, it is not easy for any party to come up with fresh concepts for a manifesto, least of all one which has been in power for the best part of two decades. With now six parties competing for space, there are very few fresh or novel ideas in politics likely to catch a headline.

For the SNP, much of what was announced in their manifesto was simply a retread of previous pledges which have not been delivered. So we saw the perennial commitment to dual the A9 from Perth to Inverness, now being promised by 2035, when previous manifestos had a firm commitment to its completion by last year.

Similarly, we saw a commitment to paying a first-time housebuyers’ grant, something first promised by the SNP as far back as 2007, and yet not delivered. And again there was a pledge to reform the Council Tax, something the SNP promised to abolish 19 years ago. The obvious question which the SNP have failed to answer is why, after 19 years of these pledges not being met, would we have any trust in them being delivered now?

READ MORE: Holyrood Election 2026: All the party manifestos and key pledges at a glance

John Swinney metaphorically 'jumped the shark', like Fonzie in Happy Days, when he launched the SNP's manifesto (Picture: Lisa Ferguson) | Lisa Ferguson / The Scotsman

‘1970s-style price controls’

But it wasn’t just retreads of previous pledges that featured in the manifesto launch, and this takes us to the jumping the shark moment, which was John Swinney’s flagship policy to introduce a cap on food prices in Scottish supermarkets. The First Minister unveiled his plan to create statutory price ceilings for food staples such as bread, milk, eggs and chicken, in order to help families struggling with the cost of living.

The criticism for this policy came loud and fast. The Scottish Retail Consortium, representing Scotland’s grocers and supermarkets, accused Swinney of “recreating 1970s-style price controls and gimmicks”, pointing out that supermarkets operate on slim profit margins due to intense competition in the sector, and that food price increases were driven by government regulation and soaring supply costs.

Similarly concerned were the Scottish Grocers Federation, representing smaller convenience stores and corner shops. As the policy would only apply to larger supermarkets, this would make prices in their stores less competitive, thus driving footfall away from them towards the larger retailers, putting a sector already under intense pressure at even greater risk of business failure.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies joined in, warning that the move risked creating food shortages by causing demand to exceed supply, and that products could be reformulated to reduce production costs, therefore having a negative impact on their quality.

There is also the impact on farmers and food producers to consider. Supermarkets having the price of, for example, milk artificially depressed will not want to see their profit margin squeezed, so any reduction will be passed onto their supplier. A Scottish dairy farmer will face the prospect of his already tight margins being squeezed down to a point where the cost of production of milk is more than he can sell it for, putting the viability of his business at risk.

READ MORE: How SNP's 'world-leading' £2 billion nature restoration pledge disappeared into thin air

A sinister explanation

It was clear from Swinney’s interviews about the manifesto that this is not a policy that had been road-tested with any affected sectors, nor had there been any consultation. It had all the hallmarks of something dreamed up at the last minute to generate a headline, rather than a policy on which serious work had been done.

But there’s potentially a more sinister explanation for this bizarre proposal. Swinney admitted price controls would require an exemption from the UK’s Internal Market Act, which prevents trade barriers being erected within the UK’s single market. He called on the UK Government not to block the policy, even though it would have the power to do so.

It doesn’t take the greatest cynic to see this is exactly what the SNP wants to see happen. They come forward with a policy which they claim would reduce food costs to help families with the cost of living, and hope that Labour steps in to block it.

A constitutional crisis is created, and the nationalist grievance machine goes into overdrive. It is a desperate attempt to keep pro-independence voters backing an SNP government which even they know, after two decades in power, is no closer to delivering separation than it was previously.

Any such policy would require legislation to go through the Scottish Parliament, a process which would take at least a year. Even without an intervention by the UK Government, the earliest it could be implemented would be the summer of 2027, and that is presuming that there would be no legal challenges. And so families struggling with the cost of living today are not going to see any benefit from it.

The fact that this was the headline announcement from the SNP tells us all we need to know about where the party currently stands. After two decades in power, it is stale, exhausted and out of ideas. If a cap on food prices is the best they come up with then they do not deserve to be rewarded with another five years in power.

Murdo Fraser is the Scottish Conservative candidate for Perthshire North