Retailers are conducting annual pay reviews in an environment transformed by the Covid pandemic. 

Staff at retailers permitted to trade have been celebrated as key workers, keeping consumers supplied with essential goods and facing heightened levels of abuse. Their efforts, and those of others such as distribution and delivery workers, have been rightly recognised.

Pay is the most obvious form of recognition – as Morrisons chief executive David Potts wrote for Retail Week: “Respect and admiration do not butter any bread.”  Morrisons, like many of the grocers, has upped pay dramatically.