The other day, I caught the middle of an interview with a man from one of the larger supermarkets on the radio. He was lamenting the fact that, at the moment, only 35 per cent of the urban population and only 25 per cent of the rural population have access to all four of the big supermarkets.

Only? I thought. Isn’t that enough? Not for him it wasn’t. What he wants, or what he says he wants, is everyone in Britain to have the choice of shopping at all four major supermarkets.

And I wondered: does anyone listening think this guy is really speaking for them, as a shopper? Was anyone thinking, yeah! That’s what I want – four different supermarkets within easy driving distance. Why not build them right outside my door? I can’t imagine why anyone would want that. But if you think you do, you should be careful what you wish for… because if the big four ever achieve that level of saturation, ‘choice’ is the last thing you’ll have. Supermarket shopping will be all you’re allowed for the rest of your days – you’re not going to have anywhere else to buy your daily bread.

But then I realised that everyone having access to four supermarkets isn’t really what he wants, either. What he really wants is everyone having access to one of his stores. Of course, he put it slightly differently. He put it in a way that allowed him to express his ideal as if it’s some kind of gift to the consumer.

And this is what really got my goat. This is the big lie peddled every day by the supermarkets. They are constantly telling us that all they ever do is give the consumer what they want. But time and time again they have been guilty of putting their stores where they are emphatically not wanted, and of rail-roading or simply buying out local planning policy to do so.