By Stefan Boscia
The chair of the UK’s biggest retailer has praised Labour’s economic plans and said “there’s only one team on the field” – Sir Keir Starmer’s party.
Tesco chair John Allan today said “I don’t think we’ve seen a growth plan from the Conservatives”, but that “we’ve seen the beginnings, I think, of a quite plausible growth plan from Labour”.
Tesco is the country’s biggest private sector employer, with around 350,000 staff across the country.
Allan’s comments come after a series of polls this month have shown Labour is trusted more on the economy than the Conservatives in the wake of the market chaos caused by the government’s mini-Budget last month.
Prime Minister Liz Truss has been forced to reverse most of her £45bn package of tax cuts, promised as a part of her Tory leadership campaign, and on Friday sacked Kwasi Kwarteng as chancellor.
Labour last month released its industrial strategy plan, which promises to give tax breaks for firms that increase investment, to reform business rates and pump billions of pounds into subisidies for green energy infrastructure.
Allan told the BBC today that the country needs “a government, whichever party it is that clearly demonstrates it’s going to be different in the future than it’s been for the last 10 years”.
“I don’t think we’ve seen a growth plan from the Conservatives, I hope we will. We’ve seen the beginnings, I think, of a quite plausible growth plan from Labour,” he said.
“So, at the moment, their ideas are on the table and many of them are actionable and attractive. And I wait to hear what the government has to say in due course.
“But at the moment, there’s really only one team on the field.”
New chancellor Jeremy Hunt today said he would need to make “difficult decisions” to balance the Treasury’s books and calm financial markets.
“Spending is not going to increase by as much as people hoped and indeed we’re going to ask for government departments to find more efficiencies than they’d planned,” he told the BBC.
“Taxes are not going to go down as quickly as people thought and some taxes are going to go up, so it’s going to be very, very difficult and I think we have to be honest with people about that.”
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