In early September SIX filed a members’ statement to Coles along, with our campaign partners: ocean charity Australian Marine Conservation Society and sustainable super fund Future Super.

The statement was supported by nearly 200 other Coles shareholders and calls on the supermarket to tackle its plastic pollution problem. 

In late September, Coles’ Company Secretary wrote to SIX and confirmed they will publish the members’ statement in their notice of meeting. 

This notice went to all 400,000+ Coles shareholders. This gives them a copy of that statement to read and consider ahead of the company’s Annual General Meeting (AGM). It’s a key milestone in the campaign to hold Coles accountable for their plastic pollution and get them to act!

In the meantime SIX, Future Super and AMCS are shaping up the most important questions we want to ask Coles at their AGM in Melbourne on 6 November. 

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After years of criticism that the major supermarkets aren’t being transparent about how much plastic packaging they use, Woolworths publicly reported the plastic intensity score for its own brand packaging for the first time in August this year. 

Plastic intensity scores the average amount of plastic packaging used per product sold, and when reported year-on-year,  will provide a helpful measure for us to see Woolworths' overall progress on reducing plastic packaging - something AMCS have been asking the company to do for years! 

This decision by Woolworths, plus their continued positive engagement with our partner AMCS on this issue, means we decided not to lodge a members’ statement or shareholder resolution to them on plastics in 2026. We’ll still attend the Woolworths AGM to make sure plastic pollution stays on the agenda, and they are still facing a shareholder vote against their Chair for our Save the Skate campaign. 

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