Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on April 16, 2026
2 min readLast updated: April 16, 2026
Add as preferred source on GoogleScotland’s SNP pledges to cap prices on 20–50 essential food items like bread, milk, cheese if re‑elected, aiming to shield households from surging inflation driven by global energy and fertilizer shocks.
LONDON, April 16 (Reuters) - Scotland's governing Scottish National Party said on Thursday it would introduce a maximum price for "essential" supermarket items such as bread, milk and cheese to help protect voters from rising food inflation.
The SNP, which runs Scotland's semi-autonomous devolved government, said it would cap the prices of between 20 and 50 products — including eggs, rice and chicken — if it is re-elected in next month's election.
Scotland's leader, John Swinney, said the measures were aimed at easing cost-of-living pressures while also improving public health.
"People are, quite simply, struggling to afford food," Swinney said at the party’s manifesto launch. "In a rich country like Scotland, that is a moral outrage."
Companies have warned that higher energy costs linked to the war in Iran are pushing up prices. Britain's food prices are set to rise by almost 10% this year because of the conflict — about three times faster than previously forecast — the country’s food and drink manufacturers’ lobby said this month.
The SNP, which wants independence from the rest of the United Kingdom, is on course to win a majority in next month’s election, according to some polls.
The party said in its manifesto that it would "require large supermarkets" to make one line of listed essential food items available at the capped price.
The manifesto said it would not require supermarkets "to make every variation of that type of food they stock available at that price".
But the Scottish Retail Consortium, which represents supermarkets, called it a "wrongheaded 1970s gimmick", a reference to unsuccessful price controls to curb soaring inflation more than half a century ago.
In 1972, the then-British Prime Minister Ted Heath introduced a freeze on wages and prices in a bid to curb inflation.
Consumer price inflation peaked in 1975 at 24.5% and it was not until the 1990s that it fell sustainably into low single digits.
(Reporting by Andrew MacAskill and Andy Bruce; editing by Alexandra Hudson)
The SNP plans to cap prices on up to 50 essential supermarket items like bread, milk, cheese, eggs, rice, and chicken.
The price cap is aimed at protecting voters from rising food inflation and easing cost-of-living pressures.
Large supermarkets will be required to offer at least one line of each essential food item at the capped price.
Rising energy costs, worsened by the war in Iran, are driving up food prices, with inflation expected to approach 10%.
The Scottish Retail Consortium criticized the plan as a 'wrongheaded 1970s gimmick,' referencing past failed price control policies.
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