High street giants plot new warning to Treasury over retail jobs

Retail giants including Asda, Marks & Spencer, Primark and Tesco will mount a new year campaign to warn Rachel Reeves that plans to hike business rates on larger shops will put jobs and stores under threat.

Sky News has learnt that some of Britain's biggest chains - which also include J Sainsbury, Morrisons and Kingfisher-owned B&Q - have agreed to revive a group called the Retail Jobs Alliance (RJA).

Sources said the RJA, which was established to push for reform of Britain's archaic business rates regime, is expected to engage with the Treasury in the coming weeks to say that a wave of tax rises and regulatory changes will threaten investment by major retailers in economically deprived areas of the country.

They intend to produce analysis showing many of the stores with so-called rateable values above a new £500,000 threshold are located in areas which rely on retailers for employment opportunities.

The revamped coalition is expected to be launched in January and is likely to include other high street names, according to insiders.

It is said to be coordinating its plans with the British Retail Consortium (BRC), the industry's leading trade body.

In total, the RJA's members employ more than a million people across Britain and account for a significant proportion of the stores with rateable values in excess of the proposed threshold.

One source close to the group's plans said it intended to highlight that the higher business rates multiplier contradicted Labour's manifesto pledge to "[level] the playing field between high street and online retailers".

The latest intervention by retail bosses will come after weeks of vocal complaints about the impact of Ms Reeves's maiden budget on the sector.

Last month, a letter signed by dozens of industry chiefs including from Boots and Next said the budget would pile £7bn of extra costs on to them.

These included a £2.3bn hit from changes to employers' national insurance, £2.73bn from an increase in the national living wage and a £2bn packaging levy bill.

Retailers have since queued up to warn that consumers will face rising prices when the tax changes come into force in April.

Stuart Machin, the M&S chief executive, and Andrew Higginson, the JD Sports Fashion and BRC chair, have been among those publicly critical of the new measures.

Tesco alone faces having to pay £1bn in extra employer national insurance contributions during this parliament.

This week, ShoeZone, a footwear chain, said it would close 20 shops as a result of poor trading and the increased costs announced in the budget.

The hospitality industry has also highlighted the possibility of price hikes and job losses after the chancellor delivered her statement on 30 October.

In response to the growing business backlash, Ms Reeves told the CBI's annual conference last month that she was "not coming back with more borrowing or more taxes".

The RJA was initially put together in 2022 by WPI Strategy, a London-based public affairs firm.

None of the members of the RJA contacted by Sky News this weekend would comment.

(c) Sky News 2024: High street giants plot new warning to Treasury over retail jobs