Sainsbury's gets sales boost as CEO voices concern over taxes

The government should be wary of loading retailers with more tax after the "high impact", particularly on jobs, of raising national insurance costs this year, the boss of Sainsbury's said yesterday.

- Sarah Butler

The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, is under pressure to raise fresh funds in her autumn budget as she attempts to fix public services and grow the economy while meeting her fiscal rules and dealing with the fallout from the government's U-turn on welfare cuts.

"[The government] have got to be cautious about the amount of cost coming into the industry," said Simon Roberts, the chief executive of the supermarket group, which also owns the catalogue chain Argos and the furniture brand Habitat.

Retailers had warned since Reeves's autumn budget that the chancellor's £25bn increase in employer national insurance contributions (NICs) and 6.7% national living wage rise, introduced in April, would force them to raise their prices.