Closing summary
Our main stories today:
The boss of John Lewis pledged the group would always remain employee-owned “no ifs no buts” after staff members backed her to continue as chair but expressed their dismay at the retailer’s poor performance last year.
Sharon White had faced controversy after reports she was considering selling a stake in the company to an outside investor in an attempt to raise £2bn. On Wednesday, her leadership was tested in a confidence vote at a twice-yearly meeting of the retailer’s 60-strong council, which is elected by employees to represent them.
Announcing the result of votes on past performance and White’s ongoing mandate, Chris Earnshaw, president of the partnership council, said: “The council voted in support of the chairman to progress the partnership in relation to its purpose, principles and rules. The council did not support last year’s performance, in which we reported a full-year loss and no partner bonus.”
The department store and Waitrose supermarket owner reported hefty losses for 2022, which meant staff did not receive an annual bonus.
The price of goods and services in the US remained stubbornly high in April, rising 4.9.% from a year ago, the labor department reported on Wednesday.
The annual rate of inflation has fallen sharply since hitting a 40-year high of 9.1% last June. April’s rise nearly matched the 5% rise recorded in March. It was the 10th consecutive month that the rate had declined but prices are still rising at a rate that is more than twice the Federal Reserve’s target rate of 2% a year.
The latest consumer price index (CPI) – a widely followed measure of the costs for goods and services in the US economy – showed prices rising 0.4% over the month, up from a 0.1% increase in March.
Longer lorries are to be fully permitted on Great Britain’s roads after the government said it would introduce laws to allow their use, despite warnings that the move will increase the number of fatal road accidents.
The Department for Transport (DfT) said lorries measuring up to 18.55 metres long – 2.05 metres longer than the current standard size – would be allowed from the end of this month.
Asos has dived £291m into the red after sales slumped in what the online fashion retailer called a “challenging trading backdrop”, with shoppers returning to physical high street stores and cutting spending on non-essentials.
Sales fell by 8%, including a 10% drop in the UK, in the six months to 28 February – far worse than the 3% forecast by the City. The company said it had deliberately shifted away from unprofitable sales and suffered from weak consumer demand and the December postal strikes.
Thank you for reading. We’ll be back tomorrow. Bye! – JK
Here is our full story on John Lewis:
