{"id":616566,"date":"2026-06-02T06:33:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T06:33:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/616566\/"},"modified":"2026-06-02T06:33:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T06:33:11","slug":"britain-has-rarely-been-this-anti-growth-says-ms-chairman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/616566\/","title":{"rendered":"Britain has rarely been this anti-growth, says M&#038;S chairman"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>M&amp;S executives <a class=\"ck-custom-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/business\/2026\/04\/02\/ms-attacks-khan-retailers-brace-weekend-chaos\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">wrote earlier this year<\/a> to both Sir Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, and Shabana Mahmood, the Home Secretary, demanding that they do more to tackle shoplifting.<\/p>\n<p>Writing in The Telegraph, Thinus Keeve, the M&amp;S retail director, said: \u201cWithout a government seriously cracking down on crime and a mayor that prioritises effective policing, we are powerless.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Mr Machin has also urged the Government to roll back taxes and regulation to stop the cost of a weekly shop spiralling higher, saying: \u201cThere is so much in the Government\u2019s control. So my advice to Government is to reduce some of the tax and regulatory burdens and free us up in a very competitive market.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Helen Dickinson, the chief executive at the British Retail Consortium, said: \u201cThe cost burden on retail is higher than it\u2019s ever been before, and it\u2019s the everyday public who suffer as mounting government policy drives up prices.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A spokesman for the Treasury said: \u201cWe have the right economic plan \u2013 we\u2019re backing the high street by reforming business rates, with a \u00a34.3bn support package to limit bills rises, capping corporation tax at 25pc, cutting red tape and taking action on the cost of living to boost the sector.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe decisions we made at the Budget mean we can stabilise the economy and deliver support for families and businesses, including cutting the cost of living.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>M&amp;S\u2019s annual report, published on Monday, also revealed Mr Machin\u2019s total pay package halved last year.<\/p>\n<p>He made \u00a33.97m, including his salary and pension, down from \u00a37.1m a year earlier. The drop was fuelled by the retailer\u2019s decision to scrap bonuses last year after a damaging cyber attack, as well as lower awards from a share performance plan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"M&amp;S executives wrote earlier this year to both Sir Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, and Shabana Mahmood,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616567,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[84,2980,8718,1294,160075,209779,209780,5438,719,56,1893,54,55],"class_list":["post-616566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-companies","tag-cost-of-living-crisis","tag-economy","tag-live-priority","tag-marks-amp-spencer","tag-retail-and-consumer-industry","tag-standard","tag-supermarkets","tag-uk","tag-uk-economy","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=616566"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616566\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}