Price Gouging

That this House applauds the excellent work of consumer organisation Which? in its investigations into price-gouging during the Covid19 crisis; is deeply concerned with the recent trend of unreasonable hikes in the prices of essential items by online retailers due to the covid-19 pandemic, a practice known as price gouging; understands that there have been reports of excessive price rises for essential items such as cleaning products and baby formula, due to the coronavirus crisis, particularly through online retailers such as eBay and Amazon; is shocked by the findings of Which? that there has been a 1000 per cent increase in the prices of products like Dettol cleaning spray by some third party sellers online and in response has launched an app to help people more easily report coronavirus profiteering; urges people to report any instances of price gouging of which they become aware; condemns those seeking to make excessive profits at the time of a global health crisis, which will cause huge difficulties for those in need of some basic essential items; understands that large online retailers like eBay and Amazon are now working to address price gouging and urges them to do more to do more to monitor and regulate what their sellers are charging; and calls on the Government to introduce stronger regulations to prevent this price gouging and give the Competition and Markets Authority greater powers to investigate and tackle this important issue.