Western Australia potato battle heads to court after negotiations fail

Western Australia’s potato wars have landed in court, after the state’s all-powerful potato regulator and its biggest grower failed to come to terms. The Potato Marketing Corporation (PMC) and Tony Galati, the self-styled “rebel” grower and founder of grocery chain Spudshed, were listed for a directions hearing at the supreme court on Thursday, after the former made good on its threat to take its dispute with Galati to court if he did not cease his unauthorised potato production. Galati and the PMC have been warring since 2013, when, the PMC alleges, Galati breached his agreement with it and deliberately grew more than his allocated share of potatoes, which he then sold in his Spudshed stores. More