Businesses have warned that cost-of-living legislation set to be debated in the Senate today could have unintended consequences.

The Cost of Living Amendment (No 2) Act 2026 made it through the House of Assembly on Friday, despite pushback from the One Bermuda Alliance, expanding the powers of the Cost of Living Commission.

The amendments are expected to face further challenge when they come before the Senate today.

A senior industry source, speaking on behalf of several wholesalers and importers, told The Royal Gazette that changes would present a particular challenge when it comes to the importation of healthy foods because it limits the ability for businesses to adjust prices.

The source said: “Fresh chicken, salads, fresh produce, none of it grown here at scale, all of it perishable, all of it repriced shipment by shipment because quality, wastage and supply change with every boat or plane.

“Once an item is placed on this Bill's schedule, a price increase of 5 per cent or more cannot take effect for 30 days while a commission decides. A case of lettuce doesn't last 30 days. Fresh chicken doesn’t last 30 days.

“When fresh food becomes the riskiest food to import, stores retreat to tins and boxes because processed goods sit more safely inside the thresholds.

“For our seniors, for children, for every family trying to eat well on this island, that is the wrong direction and nobody who cares about the health of this community should want a law that makes fresh food the hardest food to sell.”

The source said that additional regulations would lead to additional costs as businesses pay to comply and the Government pays to administer the regime.

The source said: “Nobody has said how many people, or what it costs, because nobody has done the models.

“In the end, Bermudian families pay both, at the checkout and through their taxes. A law intended to reduce the cost of living should not begin by increasing costs.”

The source said that the amendments flew in the face of previous statements in the House and the Senate that price controls would not be a part of the Cost of Living Commission and the collection of cost details other than retail price were not for public consumption.

They added: “What is before senators on Wednesday does not match those assurances. There was no consultation with industry on this Bill and no modelling has been published.”

The Cost of Living Amendment (No 2) Act 2026 allows for the designation, price-information monitoring and price sharing of critical services.

The legislation would also enable price-increase controls on essential commodities, as well as consultation and collaboration between the commission and other public authorities with responsibility for the regulation or consumer protection of commodities.

The Government said that the legislation would provide greater price transparency and empower the Cost of Living Commission to determine how duty relief on essential items was passed on to consumers.

However, the OBA expressed concerns that the changes would create an additional layer of red tape, increasing levels of bureaucracy and potentially increasing costs.

Zach Moniz, the manager of Lindo’s, said that if approved, the new legislation would put additional pressure on businesses already grappling with the administrative burden of previous changes.

He said that additional requirements included in the most recent amendments would create further challenges by limiting price increases on covered goods to 5 per cent without approval.

Mr Moniz said that the proposal was “not realistic” considering some of the perishable goods on the list, including berries and eggs, which can go through significant price fluctuations based on international supply and demand.

He said: “Eventually, you are going to say I can’t take a risk on if the minister is going to approve this price. I might just have to sit on it until the price comes down again.”

Mr Moniz said that earlier amendments to the Cost of Living Act had resulted in additional work that was only now being fully realised.

He said that while it was perfectly reasonable for the Government to want to know what the return on investment was for duty relief on essential goods, meeting the requirements involved the production of thousands of records a month.

Mr Moniz said: “If we had some sight of these amendments and we had a conversation beforehand, we could have hashed it out and figured out a better way forward.

“We were in the middle of trying to figure out how to report to Amendment No 1 when we got sight of Amendment No 2, and it was really frustrating.”

He said that price increases in Bermuda were often driven by international factors, and attempting to regulate prices at the retailer side was the equivalent of “regulating the last car in the traffic jam”.

Spencer Butterfield, chief executive of Butterfield & Vallis, said the company had been involved in discussions with the MInistry of Home Affairs and the Cost of Living Commission, detailing its pricing methodologies and taking part in the Affordable Bermuda Basket initiative.

However, he said the company was surprised to see the new legislation includes provisions relating to oversight of price increases.

He said: “Our concern is not with the objective of helping Bermudians manage rising costs. Rather, it is whether the proposed regulatory framework is practical, proportionate and likely to achieve the intended outcome.

“Food distribution is unlike many other regulated industries. The prices we pay for products can fluctuate rapidly due to factors entirely outside Bermuda’s control.”

Mr Butterfield said wholesalers often do not know the final landed cost of goods until they are in transit or have already arrived on the island, and challenges of adjusting prices would have knock-on effects.

He said: “Any regulatory framework that increases uncertainty surrounding pricing decisions inevitably increases business risk.

“Increased risk will discourage future investment, reduce incentives to expand food infrastructure and potentially accelerate trends toward disintermediation, where local storage, inventory and distribution functions move offshore.”

Mr Butterfield also said the company was concerned about the level of consultation, stating that stakeholders should have been given the opportunity to provide feedback, identify practical challenges and address unintended consequences.

He said: “We are not opposed to transparency, accountability or reasonable measures designed to ensure that consumers benefit from reductions in duties, taxes or other costs.

“Indeed, we have previously expressed our willingness to pass such savings through to customers and to provide reasonable reporting demonstrating that those savings have been realised.

“Our concern is that the current approach risks focusing regulatory attention on the final stage of a much larger global supply chain. The overwhelming majority of factors driving food inflation originate long before goods arrive on Bermuda’s shores.

“For this reason, we respectfully question whether increased regulation of wholesalers and retailers will materially improve affordability for Bermudian consumers.”

A spokesman for Bermuda Container Lines said that it fully supported the Government’s intention to make Bermuda more affordable, but expressed concern about the lack of consultation.

The spokesman said: “In light of only learning of this Bill on Saturday after it had already been debated and passed in the House of Assembly on Friday, our greatest concern is that legislation with such far-reaching implications, under the remit of a single minister, appears to have proceeded without meaningful consultation with Bermuda’s shipping companies or the many businesses whose operations would be directly affected.

“The absence of industry engagement risks producing legislation that, while well intentioned, may undermine the long-term reliability and affordability of Bermuda’s supply chain.”