Whatever John Boumphrey thought he was taking on when he became Amazon’s UK boss, he almost certainly underestimated it. 

When he was appointed in November 2020, Britain was engulfed in the second major wave of Covid-19 infections and Amazon was seeing a surge in demand as customers who were stuck at home turned to online shopping. 

He was then forced to confront more mayhem last year when the Russian invasion of Ukraine threw global supply chains into chaos, leading to soaring inflation and sparking the cost-of-living crisis. 

But the extent of the company’s growth since the pandemic has shocked even veteran staff – and Boumphrey has seen his British workforce more than double to 75,000 since he started. 

‘It wasn’t easy and there was a lot of learning on the job,’ he admits. ‘I’m looking forward to having a normal year, because I haven’t had one yet.’ 

Boumphrey’s calm and jovial manner contrasts with the frantic hive of activity at our meeting place – the main floor of one of Amazon’s massive warehouses, or as the company calls them, ‘fulfilment depots, near Dartford on the south bank of the Thames.

Behind us, machines and employees are busy picking, packing and shipping thousands of items to waiting customers across Britain in a symphony of whirring conveyor belts, beeping barcode readers and aptly named ‘Slam’ (scan, label, apply and manifest) robots stamping addresses on packages. The warehouse itself, the size of six-and-a-half football pitches, is only slightly younger than Boumphrey’s tenure as UK manager, having opened its doors in 2021. 

And the rapid expansion that he has presided over shows no signs of slowing down. Amazon plans to open two more warehouses before the end of the year, one of which will be based in the West Midlands town of Sutton Coldfield and will create up to 1,400 jobs. 

The company will also keep moving into the bricks-and-mortar world of physical shops with its Amazon Fresh brand.

Boumphrey dismisses recent reports of shop closures in some areas, saying it is part and parcel of running the division.

‘One of my roles as country manager is to champion the UK and make sure we are at the forefront of receiving investment,’ Boumphrey says. 

Amazon launched in Britain in 1998. At that time, it was still primarily an online bookseller headed by founder Jeff Bezos, who appeared to be intent on upending the traditional publishing industry. 

Since then, it has grown into one of the country’s largest private-sector employers and a one-stop-shop for virtually everything that can be bought legally. 

This was emphasised by data released last week showing the top 25 most popular products of all time on Amazon.co.uk. The list, which is topped by Andrex Gentle Clean toilet rolls, also includes the much-derided Crocs shoes, Earth Rated dog poo bags and Nizoral anti-dandruff shampoo, alongside more predictable wares such as Harry Potter books, the card game Dobble and the Echo Dot smart speaker.

Boumphrey has witnessed the stark shift in shopping patterns over the past year as the cost-ofliving crisis has piled pressure on household budgets. 

‘We’ve seen people buying more unbranded goods and also changing the sizes of their purchases. They are either buying in bulk to save money or buying items in smaller sizes than they were before.’ 

But one customer the company can seemingly count on is the boss himself, saying he and his family ‘buy everything on Amazon’, including multiple Kindle ebooks to satiate their reading habits. 

Brought up on the Wirral near Liverpool, Boumphrey, 48, has a family legacy in retail. His father worked as a regional manager for US food giant General Foods, now a part of Kraft Heinz. His mother, meanwhile, initially stayed at home before retraining as an adult literacy teacher when he was a teenager. 

In his professional life, Boumphrey spent more than seven years as a manager at US consultancy Bain & Company before nearly five years at DIY retailer Homebase. He joined Amazon in 2011. Since then the retail and tech giant’s presence in Britain has exploded, with its workforce surging from around 2,500 staff. 

His ascent to the top of the British arm of the business almost mirrors the dramatic expansion of Amazon UK over the past decade, as well as how the retail landscape has altered drastically. 

He joined as a director of the music and DVD business, both of which have since been subsumed by streaming services such as Spotify, Netflix and Amazon’s own Prime arm. The father of three then steadily moved up the ranks, heading Amazon’s European fashion arm for just over two years before taking over as UK boss in 2020.

The new perspective that his current role has given him on the business environment has raised one area of concern. Surprisingly, it is not about the tax regime – an area where Amazon is frequently criticised for not paying its fair share despite the company’s claims to be one of the top 15 contributors to Revenue and Customs. 

‘I’ve got so much on my plate that I haven’t had time to really think about the UK tax regime,’ Boumphrey says, although he stresses that it is ‘really important that big businesses contribute’ to the nation’s coffers. 

Instead, he voices worries about the state of the UK’s competition regulations, saying there is an ‘opportunity’ for Britain to stand out post-Brexit from its continental counterparts. 

He says firms should have the ability to appeal the substance of decisions made by the watchdog, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), rather than the proposed regime, which allows businesses to challenge only the process by which a conclusion is reached. 

‘The CMA has significant power over companies and they can’t challenge the substance of a decision… I think a merits-based appeal approach is what we would be looking for. 

‘The UK does have an opportunity to differentiate itself from the EU. And I think what’s really important is that there are appropriate checks and balances in place.’

He adds: ‘This is an untested regime and I think for companies and the Government, it makes sense that the appeals process is fit for purpose.’ Boumphrey remains tight-lipped about Amazon’s plans in the UK beyond the imminent opening of the two new fulfilment centres, although that could be because some of it may hinge on the choices of his US bosses. 

‘I don’t have a crystal ball, unfortunately,’ he says, but reiterates that Amazon is likely to keep focusing on the very corporate-sounding area of ‘innovation’. Key to this is the rapidly developing area of artificial intelligence (AI), particularly through computer programs such as ChatGPT. 

‘Over the past six to 12 months we’ve seen generative AI really come on in leaps and bounds. And I think every part of the shopping experience is going to be reimagined by that,’ he says. 

Amazon is already working to implement AI, with the technology currently being used in the US to help summarise thousands of customer product reviews. Does he ever find himself coveting the top job at Amazon and becoming the next Jeff Bezos?

Boumphrey laughs, saying he is ‘absolutely delighted’ to be in his current role.

‘It’s a huge privilege to be managing Amazon UK. It’s a big business we’re running and I feel a responsibility to the 75,000 employees we have in Britain.’ 

He also seems uninterested in decamping to the US, where he previously worked for almost three years as Amazon’s head of consumables programmes at its Seattle headquarters. 

‘I’ve had the opportunity to work over there and absolutely loved it. But for personal reasons, I’m really happy to be back in the UK.’

Suspended Spanish FA chief Luis Rubiales has reportedly been ordered to increase his child support payments after being taken to court by his ex-wife.

The 46-year-old dad-of-three, now facing backlash after his unsolicited kiss of World Cup-winning player Jenni Hermoso, is said to have been forced to pay double the amount he previously handed over due to a ‘tenfold’ increase in his income.

Spanish TV station La Sexta reported a court in the east coast city of Valencia had ordered Rubiales to up his payments for each of his daughters from 400 to 800 euros a month.

His ex, who has been described as a lawyer and named in Spain as Maria Manuela Delicado Vega, is said to have asked for a revision of Rubiales’ child support payments after the football chief’s annual net income jumped from 97,000 euros in 2011 to a massive 955,000 euros nine years later.

In 2020, when Rubiales was on a near six-figure salary, she is said to have earned just 26,600 euros after tax.

The suspended FA chief, now a step closer to being prosecuted over the ‘unconsented’ kiss he gave World Cup winner Jenni Hermoso after she made a formal complaint, spoke about his daughters Lucia, Ana and Elena in a Spanish TV interview earlier this year.

He told interviewer Risto Mejide:’ They are very strong, stronger than me.’

He went on to describe his eldest daughter as a History of Art student, saying: ‘She’s a very sensitive person and has a strong compromise with herself and society.

‘The middle one is the one who is most like me, perhaps the most activist of the three. She’s also someone with an amazing intelligence.’

He also revealed in the interview how one of his daughters had once been ‘close to death’ after a fall which left medics needing to ‘drill her brain’ because of her head injuries.

His three daughters, believed to be aged 20, 17 and around 15, were present at a Spanish FA meeting last month when he insisted repeatedly he was not going to resign after the so-called ‘Kissgate’ scandal unfolded before his ex-hairdresser mum Angeles Bejar went on a brief hunger strike in support of her son.

Rubiales appeared to suggest he had a good relationship with his ex-wife in the interview, saying: ‘I think we have always done the best for the girls.

‘I don’t think the marriage was a failure, we were very happy, but when you move on to another phase in your life, well you move on.’

The reports about the increased child support payments, first published by respected media outlet El Periodico de España before La Sexta outlined more details from leaked court documents, state the decision was made by Valencia’s Provincial Court on June 19.

The decision pre-dated his suspension as Spanish FA president, which has led to him being deprived of his massive salary and other perks, and it is not yet clear what effect that may have on the amount he is expected to hand over in child support payments.

Rubiales’ ex is known to live in a modest house in a small town near Valencia with at least one of her daughters.

She declined to comment last month – to both Spanish and UK media – after the ‘Kissgate’ scandal broke.

Rubiales has not yet made any official comment.

On Wednesday it emerged Jenni Hermoso had paved the way for the prosecution of Rubiales by filing a formal complaint against him over his infamous World Cup kiss.

Prosecutors had given her 15 days to accuse Rubiales of sexually assaulting her by kissing her on the lips without her consent after Spain’s Women’s World Cup victory over England last month.

The action, which Rubiales says was consensual and has described as a ‘peck’, sparked the Kissgate scandal which led to the dad-of-three being suspended by Fifa for 90 days, a church hunger strike by his pensioner mum and the sacking of team manager Jorge Vilda.

Without it state prosecutors, now expected to ask a Spanish court to place the football chief under criminal investigation in the next few days, would have been unable to prosecute Rubiales.

A judge at Spain’s Audiencia Nacional court in Madrid would be tasked with conducting the probe and decide whether Rubiales should face charges before inviting prosecutors to indict the suspended Spanish FA president.

That is because the kiss which has caused turmoil in Spanish football happened in Australia and other courts in Spain do not have the authority to act.

Prosecutors agreed late last month to invite Jenni Hermoso to file a formal complaint against Rubiales.

The footballer has said the kiss left her feeling vulnerable and a victim of aggression. She has described it as ‘an impulsive, sexist act, out of place and without any type of consent on my part.’

Rubiales, who has apologised for grabbing his crotch during post-match celebrations in front of Spain’s Queen Letizia and her 16-year-old daughter, said in a lengthy statement last week: ‘The spontaneity and happiness of the historic moment led us to carry out a mutual and consensual act, a product of great enthusiasm.

‘At no time was there any aggression, indeed, there was not even the slightest discomfort, but an overflowing joy in both of us.’

Rubiales’ 72-year-old mum broke off her hunger strike at a church in her son’s hometown of Motril near Granada on Wednesday of last week after being rushed to hospital 48 hours into her protest.

She said she had launched it to get Jenni, who has now returned to the Mexican city of Pachuca where she plays her club football, to ‘tell the truth’ about the kiss.

Speaking from the inside of the church before falling ill, she said: ‘I just want the truth to be told.

‘She knows my son is very honest. If she tells the truth everything will be fixed.’

Referring to the World Cup kiss that has led to the so-called ‘Kissgate’ scandal, she added: ‘It was an anecdote, as she herself said, and look how far it’s gone.

‘She should have a conscience and act according to it.

‘My son is very worried and has asked me not to continue, to stop, but I will be here until I drop and my body can continue.’

Spanish FA president Luis Rubiales was spotted pulling Spain’s World Cup-winning goal-scorer Olga Carmona into an embrace just hours after he was forced to apologise for kissing a Spanish footballer on the mouth. 

Rubiales, 45, was spotted hugging the top-flight defender as La Roja landed back in Madrid on Monday night, a day after Spain’s women’s team took the World Cup home for the first time ever. 

Carmona, 23, only learned of her father’s death after the final on Sunday. 

While he passed away last Friday, her family reportedly decided not to tell her so that she could wholly focus on the match.  

Rubiales’ and Carmona’s embrace comes after the Spanish FA boss was forced to apologise for kissing player Jenni Hermoso following his country’s Women’s World Cup final win over England in Australia.

The football chief had faced a wave of criticism and resignation calls after planting the unsolicited kiss on Jenni’s lips following the match.

In a video address published after leading politicians said he should quit or apologise, Rubiales admitted he had made a mistake.

He started the video by saying the Spanish team had achieved an ‘historic feat’ and it was one of the ‘happiest’ days for Spanish football.

But he added: ‘There is also something I regret and it’s over something that happened between a female player and myself who enjoy a magnificent relationship the same as I have with other women players.

‘I’ve no doubt made a mistake and I have to admit it.’

He continued: ‘At a moment of maximum excitement, without any bad intention or bad faith, what happened happened in a very spontaneous manner, I repeat without bad faith on either side.

‘We didn’t understand really what occurred afterwards because we saw it as something normal and natural but it has caused a controversy in some sectors and some people appear to have been upset and therefore I have to apologise.

‘Moreover I have to learn from this and understand that when someone presides an institution as important as the Spanish FA he has to take more care in events like ceremonies.’

Defending his initial reaction in the wake of the controversy, when he branded the people who had criticised the kiss as ‘idiots’, and admitting he was saddened because it had tainted the historic Spanish victory, he continued: ‘Within the Spanish FA no-one lent the slightest importance to this but outside it seems they have.

‘I also want to apologise to those people because if people have been affected outside, they will no doubt have their reasons.’

Rubiales made his public apology as he faced resignation calls over his controversial post-Women’s World Cup celebrations which included giving player Jenni Hermoso an unwanted kiss on the lips.

The 45-year-old had been accused of committing ‘sexual violence’ overnight by Spain’s acting Equality Minister Irene Montero for the unsolicited smacker following the country’s 1-0 win against England.

He initially laughed it off as a ‘peck on the lips between two friends celebrating something’ even though 33-year-old Jenni admitted she hadn’t liked it in a post-match live online stream from the dressing room.

Footage subsequently emerged of Rubiales grabbing his crotch and appearing to make an obscene gesture during his wild celebrations in the stands beside Spain’s Queen Letizia and her 16-year-old daughter.

This morning Anna Caula, General Secretary of Sport for the regional Catalan government, said he should resign.

She called the kiss he planted on Jenni Hermoso’s lips as a ‘harsh aggression’ and added: ‘We must be aware there are things that are not a price that we should have to pay.

‘In football things are still not equal, we still have a lot of work to do.

‘It is up to a president of the Spanish FA to be scrupulous in the way he behaves himself

‘The explanation for this kiss and the subsequent declarations that have been made justifying it means us normalising attitudes that are not acceptable.’

Marta Lois, parliamentary spokesperson for Spanish left-wing coalition party Sumar, said: ‘This type of sexist behaviour towards the Spanish player Jennifer Hermoso is intolerable.

‘Mr Rubiales must resign. It’s shocking.’

Colleague Ernest Urtasum insisted Rubiales should resign, saying: ‘The image he has shown the world is one of repugnant machoism. This cannot go unpunished.’

Spanish politician Pablo Echenique, a member of hard-left wing party Podemos, was among those who picked up on Rubiales’ crotch grab while the controversy surrounding his kiss was still raging.

He tweeted along video footage of the alleged obscene gesture: ‘As well as giving Jenni Hermoso a non-consensual kiss on the lips while he grabbed her head, an act that could represent the commission of a crime, Rubiales also celebrated Spain’s victory grabbing his testicles next to the queen and her daughter.’

He also posted a photo of the Spanish FA president planting a sloppy kiss on the left cheek of goalscorer Olga Carmona, who learnt after the match her father had died, and wrote on his Twitter feed: ‘Here he is too with Olga Carmona.

‘It seems this guy was drooling over and stalking the whole team.’

Rubiales has yet to comment on the claims he grabbed his private parts in front of Spain’s leading female royals.

He was filmed in the dressing room after yesterday’s World Cup final, announcing a trip to Ibiza for Spain’s winning women as a prize before joking in front of Jenni Hermoso and her teammates: ‘In Ibiza we’ll be celebrating Jenni and Luis Rubiales’ wedding.

Hermoso admitted she hadn’t liked the kiss in a live online stream to fans from the dressing room.

In subsequent comments facilitated by Spain’s FA, the Madrid-born footballer who currently plays for Mexican side Pachuca, referred to the moment as a ‘mutually and totally spontaneous gesture’ and insisted: ‘The president and I have a great relationship.’

Spanish FA president Luis Rubiales has apologised for kissing player Jenni Hermoso following his country’s Women’s World Cup final win over England in Australia.

The football chief had faced a wave of criticism and resignation calls after planting the unsolicited kiss on Jenni’s lips following the match.

In a video address today after leading politicians said he should quit or apologise, Rubiales admitted he had made a mistake.

He started the video by saying the Spanish team had achieved an ‘historic feat’ and it was one of the ‘happiest’ days for Spanish football.

But he added: ‘There is also something I regret and it’s over something that happened between a female player and myself who enjoy a magnificent relationship the same as I have with other women players.

‘I’ve no doubt made a mistake and I have to admit it.’

He continued: ‘At a moment of maximum excitement, without any bad intention or bad faith, what happened happened in a very spontaneous manner, I repeat without bad faith on either side.

‘We didn’t understand really what occurred afterwards because we saw it as something normal and natural but it has caused a controversy in some sectors and some people appear to have been upset and therefore I have to apologise.

‘Moreover I have to learn from this and understand that when someone presides an institution as important as the Spanish FA he has to take more care in events like ceremonies.’

Defending his initial reaction in the wake of the controversy, when he branded the people who had criticised the kiss as ‘idiots’, and admitting he was saddened because it had tainted the historic Spanish victory, he continued: ‘Within the Spanish FA no-one lent the slightest importance to this but outside it seems they have.

‘I also want to apologise to those people because if people have been affected outside, they will no doubt have their reasons.’

Rubiales made his public apology as he faced resignation calls over his controversial post-Women’s World Cup celebrations which included giving player Jenni Hermoso an unwanted kiss on the lips.

The 45-year-old had been accused of committing ‘sexual violence’ overnight by Spain’s acting Equality Minister Irene Montero for the unsolicited smacker following the country’s 1-0 win against England.

He initially laughed it off as a ‘peck on the lips between two friends celebrating something’ even though 33-year-old Jenni admitted she hadn’t liked it in a post-match live online stream from the dressing room.

Footage subsequently emerged of Rubiales grabbing his crotch and appearing to make an obscene gesture during his wild celebrations in the stands beside Spain’s Queen Letizia and her 16-year-old daughter.

This morning Anna Caula, General Secretary of Sport for the regional Catalan government, said he should resign.

She called the kiss he planted on Jenni Hermoso’s lips as a ‘harsh aggression’ and added: ‘We must be aware there are things that are not a price that we should have to pay.

‘In football things are still not equal, we still have a lot of work to do.

‘It is up to a president of the Spanish FA to be scrupulous in the way he behaves himself

‘The explanation for this kiss and the subsequent declarations that have been made justifying it means us normalising attitudes that are not acceptable.’

Marta Lois, parliamentary spokesperson for Spanish left-wing coalition party Sumar, said: ‘This type of sexist behaviour towards the Spanish player Jennifer Hermoso is intolerable.

‘Mr Rubiales must resign. It’s shocking.’

Colleague Ernest Urtasum insisted Rubiales should resign ‘tomorrow’ insisting: ‘The image he has shown the world is one of repugnant machoism. This cannot go unpunished.’

Spanish politician Pablo Echenique, a member of hard-left wing party Podemos, was among those who picked up on Rubiales’ crotch grab while the controversy surrounding his kiss was still raging.

He tweeted along video footage of the alleged obscene gesture: ‘As well as giving Jenni Hermoso a non-consensual kiss on the lips while he grabbed her head, an act that could represent the commission of a crime, Rubiales also celebrated Spain’s victory grabbing his testicles next to the queen and her daughter.’

He also posted a photo of the Spanish FA president planting a sloppy kiss on the left cheek of goalscorer Olga Carmona, who learnt after the match her father had died, and wrote on his Twitter feed: ‘Here he is too with Olga Carmona.

‘It seems this guy was drooling over and stalking the whole team.’

Rubiales has yet to comment on the claims he grabbed his private parts in front of Spain’s leading female royals.

He was filmed in the dressing room after yesterday’s World Cup final, announcing a trip to Ibiza for Spain’s winning women as a prize before joking in front of Jenni Hermoso and her teammates: ‘In Ibiza we’ll be celebrating Jenni and Luis Rubiales’ wedding.

Hermoso admitted she hadn’t liked the kiss in a live online stream to fans from the dressing room.

In subsequent comments facilitated by Spain’s FA, the Madrid-born footballer who currently plays for Mexican side Pachuca, referred to the moment as a ‘mutually and totally spontaneous gesture’ and insisted: ‘The president and I have a great relationship.’

A spectacular mountainous region of the United States will this week provide the setting for central bankers to ponder decisions that will help shape the global economy over the coming months.

Officials from institutions including the US Federal Reserve, the Bank of England and the European Central Bank (ECB) will gather for the annual conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

The meeting comes as the global battle against inflation enters a new phase and markets look for clues about where central banks go next after a series of interest rate hikes.

All eyes will be on Fed chairman Jerome Powell when he delivers a speech on the economic outlook on Friday.

Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank, will also speak on Friday and Ben Broadbent, deputy governor of the Bank of England, takes the stage on Saturday.

Last year, Powell hammered home the Fed’s determination to get on top of inflation in a hawkish speech that promised to act ‘forcefully’ even as he acknowledged rate hikes would bring ‘some pain’ to households and businesses.

Today, the picture looks very different. Inflation in the US has fallen to 3.2pc – still above its 2pc target but much healthier than the 8.5pc level at the same time last year.

Europe has seen inflation fall too, while in the UK – though taking longer to tackle the price spiral – it has dropped to 6.8pc, from a peak of 11.1pc in October last year. Yet Powell is unlikely to be ready to declare victory.

Job numbers and the wider economy have not – until now – been hobbled in the way that many feared would need to happen to try to bring inflation down.

That will be welcome if it means a ‘soft landing’ – bringing inflation down without too many bumps.

But the worry is that signs of still strong wage growth and resilient consumer activity mean the inflation genie has not been entirely stuffed back into the bottle. It leaves rate-setters in a quandary about whether they should soon stop raising rates and how long they should remain there.

The wide-open prairies of the American West provide a suitably dramatic backdrop for the event, which runs from Thursday to Saturday.

In the past, film makers have taken advantage of the picturesque environs, shooting scenes for westerns such as Kevin Costner’s 1990 Oscar-winning blockbuster Dances With Wolves.

For central bankers it provides breathing space away from the hubbub of Washington, London and Frankfurt.

Neither US, UK or European officials have an imminent decision to make, with none of their next rate-setting meetings due until later next month.

But the market backdrop is tricky. Bond yields – the price investors charge for buying government debt – are rising amid growing expectations about interest rates staying higher for longer.

Andrew Hunter, deputy chief UK economist at Capital Economics, said mounting expectations of an ‘economic re-acceleration’ have set a ‘fraught backdrop’ ahead of Powell’s speech.

‘But with little evidence that stronger growth will threaten to reignite inflationary pressures, we don’t think there is any need for Powell to dust off his hawkish script from last year’s event,’ he added.

Ronald Temple, chief market strategist at asset manager Lazard, said: ‘Expect Powell to perform a balancing act of highlighting success to date in reducing headline inflation, while also acknowledging it’s too early to declare victory.’

Temple said Lagarde’s speech is also likely to be ‘straight down the middle of the fairway’, acknowledging that eurozone inflation at 5.3pc remains far too high but recognising that the ECB’s rate hikes so far ‘have not yet fully worked their way into the economy’.

Broadbent will focus on how UK real term incomes – how much people earn after the impact of inflation is taken into account – have changed, from the lead-up to the global financial crisis of 2008, to today.

It will include his views on inflation and the ‘second round’ effects – that is, when wages and prices rise in response, threatening a further spiral.

Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at investment platform CMC Markets UK, said: ‘Markets have been chopping around for several weeks now on the basis that for all the Fed’s hawkish rhetoric, the central bank is close to, or even at the end of its rate hiking cycle.

‘The key question appears to be less about how much further will rate rise, but for how long they will stay at current levels.’

NHS crisis sparks boom in private health insurance: Aviva chief Amanda Blanc reports ‘very strong demand’ for cover

By John-Paul Ford Rojas

Published: 16:51 EDT, 16 August 2023 | Updated: 16:51 EDT, 16 August 2023

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Retail is in the blood for Nish Kankiwala, the former Hovis boss who has become the first-ever chief executive of the John Lewis Partnership, owner of the department store chain and Waitrose grocery stores.

His family came to the UK from Mumbai, India, in the 1960s.

At first his parents couldn’t afford for Kankiwala and his sister to come to London, so the children stayed with their grandparents who had six sari shops.

‘I used to go to the shops on the way to school,’ he says. ‘I love fabrics.’

It sounds ideal for a man who will be responsible for all John Lewis’ cushions, curtains and beautifully upholstered sofas. Not to mention the fabled haberdashery and dressmaking departments.

Kankiwala originally had a clothes stall on Walthamstow market in east London.

He was also running the family’s shop attached to a Post Office in Tottenham, north London, when his father fell ill, while he was studying for his degree at University College London. ‘I did engineering, but I couldn’t escape my retail destiny,’ he laughs.

Kankiwala finds himself back on the shop floor in one of the hardest jobs in the industry – restoring John Lewis and Waitrose to their former status. The two chains were once synonymous with quality, service and being the undisputed destination of choice for Britain’s middle-class shoppers.

Waitrose, for example, was the first British supermarket to sell hummus – in the 1980s – and sushi – in 1996 – as well as being the first to offer organic produce.

It has its own farm and was the first to have its own vineyard. In a sign of the times it also has the largest value range with more than 900 ‘Essentials’ products.

Though its middle-class credentials still run deep, there is even an ‘Overheard in Waitrose’ satire on social media, poking gentle fun at the pretensions and foibles of the customers. But the business has struggled in the pandemic and the rampant inflation that followed.

Underlying those problems, which hit the retail sector as a whole, the department stores seemed to lose their mojo when faced with tough competition online and elsewhere on the high street.

John Lewis, the largest employee-owned operation in the UK with 74,000 partners, dropped its ‘never knowingly undersold’ policy, a move that would once have been sacrilege. Even its well-heeled customers are more hard up.

‘The Bank of England wants to make people feel a bit gloomier so they spend less, and it is working,’ says Kankiwala pointedly.

‘If you look at previous booms and busts sometimes it goes too far and we tip into recession. The trick is to avoid that. But that is for the bank. I just run shops.’

He says Anyday – the John Lewis ‘entry level brand’ for home and fashion – has ‘grown significantly’ as has the Waitrose Essentials label.

He is also looking at offering Klarna-style payments by instalments, which are often associated with lower income consumers. ‘I think we will develop a buy-now-pay-later product,’ he says. ‘Especially in the younger generation, people expect it.’

Kankiwala, who was a non-executive for two years before becoming chief executive officer, will be working alongside chairman Dame Sharon White to try and restore the partnership’s place in the nation’s hearts.

They have their work cut out. Losses for last year were £234 million and partners have had only one bonus in the past three years.

The hope is that installing Kankiwala as the first chief executive of John Lewis and Waitrose will supercharge the revival. Previously, the two chains had separate bosses, each reporting to the chairman.

‘We have never had a CEO,’ Kankiwala says. ‘In the old days we had two of everything. We have brought together all the functions and they all report to me now.’

Kankiwala’s task is to implement the recovery strategy – called the Partnership Plan – drawn up by White three years ago. The five-year blueprint aims to reduce costs, improve service and branch out into areas such as financial services and high quality rental housing.

The target is to make £200 million profits in the next two years and £400 million by 2025. Along the way, White has pledged to bring back partner bonuses when profit hits £150 million and debt falls.

But given the downturn in the economy since the plan was put in place, is this still realistic?

‘We are midway through it,’ he says. ‘We have had the cost of living, rising utility bills and an additional £180 million of costs.

‘It means we need to go even harder in some areas of the plan where I can bring my skills into play. Number one – I am fixated by customers. Growing up as I did, I can think of a thousand examples of learning from customers because they tell you the truth, though you might not like it.

‘Number two is cost. With all the extra expenditure coming out of the business we really have to make sure we are as productive as possible. In some areas we are not as efficient as other retailers. We need to look at waste and the supply chain.

‘The third area we need to supercharge is technology. We’ve not invested as fast as we should have.’

Despite three years of losses, he believes he can still hit the profit targets. ‘I broadly think they will be achieved by taking out more costs,’ he says.

‘When the previous team did the work, their assumption on inflation was about 3 per cent. We have taken out £300 million of costs already. This year we will probably take out £100 million.’

‘In procurement, we can do better. But we want to do it sustainably, not just slash.’

John Lewis has shut 16 shops since the pandemic, resulting in over 2,000 redundancies. And nine Waitrose shops have been closed, leading to more than 500 job losses. Kankiwala says there are no plans to shut any more shops.

When White talked in March about the possibility that there might be more implications for jobs, she meant by natural turnover. No redundancies were announced.

As for reinstating bonuses, he says staff are more concerned about higher basic wages. Partners have been promised they will be paid at least the Real Living Wage of £10.90 an hour – or £11.95 in London – once profit is over £200 million. Customers may be surprised this was not already the case.

There have been suggestions that the plight of John Lewis had become so desperate that White was prepared to dismantle the partnership model in order to bring in new investment. Kankiwala, however, is adamant that the partnership is safe in his hands.

Kankiwala spent most of his career in the mainstream corporate sector including Pepsico and Burger King. His most recent role was at Hovis, where he negotiated a sale to private equity.

The buyout barons have a hard-headed approach to business that is inimical to the partnership ethos. So is he really wedded to it?

‘I am,’ he insists. ‘I genuinely feel that the partnership model is a better one and will be replicated elsewhere.’

Sadly, his parents have passed away and are not here to see their son take one of the biggest jobs in British retail.

‘My mum and dad would be really proud,’ he says. ‘When I used to sell clothes on the market, we were poor. I am very privileged to be here because I come from nothing. My sister is in India and she would say ‘You have a big shop now’.’

The Reserve Bank’s outgoing governor Philip Lowe has admitted he’s the most unpopular man in Australia – but argued inflation would be even higher without his aggressive rate hikes.

Dr Lowe told a House of Representatives economics committee in Canberra he wasn’t worried about being unpopular, in his last appearance before a parliamentary hearing before he finishes in September.

‘It’s unpopular but we’ll do what’s necessary and want the community to understand that because if people come to doubt us, that will make the eventual task more difficult,’ he said on Friday. 

Dr Lowe was seated next to his deputy and successor Michele Bullock, who next month will become the first woman to lead the Reserve Bank in its 63-year history. 

He said that unlike politicians, he didn’t have to worry about being re-elected, after Treasurer Jim Chalmers declined to extend his seven-year term.

‘The reason that monetary policy has really been assigned to an independent, central bank is it’s very difficult for the political class to do what we’re currently doing – that is putting up interest rates,’ Dr Lowe said.

‘People are hurting, it’s very uncomfortable and we’re putting up interest rates.

‘In parts of the community, we’re incredibly popular – I often read in the paper that I’m the most unpopular person in the country. That’s fine.

‘It’s much harder for the political class to be unpopular in the way that the Reserve Bank and I am unpopular.’

Australian home borrowers have copped the most aggressive pace of interest rate rises since 1989 – with 12 increases since May 2022 that have taken the cash rate to an 11-year high of 4.1 per cent. 

Variable mortgage rates have typically surged by 64 per cent in little more than a year with borrowers servicing an average $600,000 mortgage paying $17,800 a year more than they did 15 months ago.

Despite that, Sydney’s median house price has been climbing in every month since February, last month rising by another one per cent to $1.334million, CoreLogic data showed.

Dr Lowe noted that Australia’s population growth pace of 2 per cent was outpacing the 1.5 per cent increase in new homes, arguing those buying now regarded the hiking cycle as being over. 

‘There’s an understandable perception in the community that the peak of interest rates is either now or close at hand,’ he said.

‘People say, “If I can afford the current rate of repayments and I don’t lose my job, there’s going to be strong demand going forward”.’

But with rents surging in Australia’s biggest cities, Dr Lowe spoke out against the idea of a rent cap, a policy advocated by the Greens.

‘They’re short-term fixes that make the problem worse,’ he said.

‘In most cases, rent controls reduce the incentive to add to supply.’

Dr Lowe said that even if rates were to rise again, they wouldn’t be going up to the same extent with crude oil prices now lower than they were last year. 

‘Interest rates have increased a lot, who knows what’s going to happen in the future, but we won’t see the type of increases in interest rates that we’ve seen over the last year,’ he said. ‘That pressure will go away.’ 

He made the suggestion despite indicating in 2021 that interest rates would stay on hold at a record-low of 0.1 per cent until 2024 ‘at the earliest’. 

Australia’s 6 per cent inflation rate is lower than the 32-year high level of 7.8 per cent reached at the end of 2022, but it’s still much higher than the wage price index of 3.7 per cent. 

‘I know high interest rates are unpopular but it’s the way to get inflation back down and real incomes rising again,’ Dr Lowe said.

‘The biggest drain on real, household disposable income over the past year isn’t higher interest rates, it’s high inflation.’

Dr Lowe, whose seven-year term expires on September 18, promised wages growth would overtake inflation in 2024 and suggested less of the cost of living burden would fall on the young.

‘There are clear differences across households – younger households who borrowed during the pandemic are having to restrain their spending more than older households who have a lot of financial assets, don’t have any debt,’ he said.

‘I think we’ll see a more equal experience over the next 12 months than we’ve had over the past 12 months.

‘The key to that is to get inflation down and to get real incomes rising again because that will help everybody.’

Australians are typically suffering a cut in real wages, whether or not that owned their home outright, had a mortgage or were renting.

‘The first point I’d make is everybody’s hurting because high inflation is eroding people’s real income,’ Dr Lowe said. 

‘And when real income goes down, you have to cut back your spending and we see that cutback in spending right across the board.

‘High inflation is eroding people’s incomes and that’s causing everyone pain and that’s why it’s so critical to get inflation down.’

The Reserve Bank is expecting wages growth to exceed four per cent in 2024, for the first time in 15 years.

Dr Lowe warned that without productivity improvements, real wages, economic growth and profitability would suffer. 

‘If we don’t we’re going to have problems,’ he said.

The RBA is expecting inflation to return to the top of its two to three per cent target by mid-2025 but Dr Lowe noted that would have still meant four years of inflation being outside the band. 

‘If we let it drift longer, people might rightly say, ‘Was the Reserve Bank really serious about this?’,’ he said, adding this would see people demand higher wages and lead to higher prices.

‘The whole inflation psychology would shift and once that happens, we know that to get inflation eventually back down means even higher interest rates and more unemployment.’

The 30-day interbank futures market and three of Australia’s Big Four banks – Commonwealth, Westpac and ANZ – believe the rate rises are over.

But NAB is forecasting one more increase in November that would take the cash rate to a 12-year high of 4.35 per cent. 

Coca-Cola chief bags £500k ‘cost-of-living’ handout

• Zoran Bogdanovic handed payments as part of salary, bonus and perks package
• It all added up to a staggering £8million over a two-year period 
• Figures highlight lavish handouts to bosses of some of Britain’s biggest firms 

By Patrick Tooher

Updated: 10:13 EDT, 6 August 2023

Some links in this article may be affiliate links. If you click on them we may earn a small commission. That helps us fund This Is Money, and keep it free to use. We do not write articles to promote products. We do not allow any commercial relationship to affect our editorial independence.

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Russia warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin kept a secret harem of barely legal women in St Petersburg before his armed mutiny against Vladimir Putin, a report has claimed.

‘The mercenary boss likes his girls on the younger side but he also has an eccentric obsession with exchanging bodily fluids with virgins,’ according to independent Russian news and investigative outlet The Insider.

A woman who ‘sold her virginity to billionaire Prigozhin when she was 18’ – and now regrets the decision – said the Wagner private army boss ‘believes having sex with first-time partners prolongs his youth’.

The revelations come one month after the Wagner chief led a band of mercenaries in an uprising against Russia’s defence ministry that saw them seize the southern city of Rostov-on-Don and bear down on Moscow before calling off the mutiny. 

Wagner fighters have since entered Belarus and are helping to train Belarusian military units while Prigozhin, 62, appears to have temporarily secured his safety amid a deal with the Russian president.  

The allegations against the Wagner supremo, who some believe had ambitions to be Russian president, are stark and detailed.

‘Before his downfall and exile to Belarus, Prigozhin used to keep a rotating harem of very young (a little over 18) girls in rented rooms at the Solo Sokos Hotel in St. Petersburg,’ alleged The Insider.

A ‘sex workers’ union representative told the media outlet that ‘he had sex without a condom’ because ‘he believed that this is how he exchanges energy, fluids’.

‘It’s as if he receives a charge of vitality from them,’ they said.

A woman named only as Masha said she lost her virginity to the Wagner chief in 2019 when she was 18 and living in his home city St Petersburg.

‘I was deeply depressed and had to go to the hospital,’ she said.

‘At that time, I met another girl, around my age, and she had been kicked out of her home and she really needed money.

‘She asked me if I would like to sell my virginity for 40,000 rubles.’

The amount was at the time the equivalent of $623 or £482.

‘I was like, ”OK, let’s”, although I didn’t need the money that much myself.’

Masha was introduced to Prigozhin’s pimp, another woman in her 30s with long, dark hair, at a cafe on Nevsky Prospekt, St. Petersburg’s main avenue, said The Insider.

‘She said I had to go to the clinic to have my virginity checked. I was sent to the Sogaz clinic, right there on the other side of Nevsky Prospekt.’

The ownership of this clinic has been linked to Putin’s elder daughter Maria Vorontsova, 38, and known to treat VIPs including Prigozhin.

‘At the reception desk, you had to say a password – ”women’s sports”,’ said Masha.

This indicated it was a hymen inspection ordered for Prigozhin.

‘After Masha’s virginity was confirmed, she was sent to the Solo Sokos Hotel on Vasilyevsky Island on the western side of the city,’ said the report.

‘It seems like there were always rooms reserved for him and the girls and there were always people who supervised them,’ the woman told the publication.

‘There were girls, not virgins, whom he paid 5,000 rubles [$78] for sex. They were the ones who told me that it was Prigozhin. They hadn’t seen him for several days.’

She claimed to have known at the time about Prigozhin and his private army, as well as his troll farms spouting pro-Putin propaganda on the internet.

‘In complete shock, I went to the hotel room and waited for him,’ she said. ‘He started knocking on the wrong door and thought that I was not opening it. He got angry.’

When he finally arrived, she ‘sat motionless on the bed’. ‘Everything was very fast,’ she said. ‘He just left the money in a pile on a chair.’

He also told her to ‘be nicer’ complaining of a ‘dour expression’ on her face as he took her virginity.

‘Even with my insane personality, selling my virginity to Prigozhin was a bit over the top,’ she said.

‘I felt really down. I remember that day I was thinking about not being late for a doctor’s appointment at the psychiatric hospital.’

The Insider alleged: ‘Masha was one of countless women Prigozhin has visited at the Solo Sokos, where his underlings kept a ready supply of them.

‘The virgins, Masha learned, he dubbed ”shampoo”, after the disposable bottles found in hotel bathrooms.

‘You open them and then toss them away.’

Prigozhin was nicknamed Putin’s chef after coming to prominence staging Kremlin banquets and winning lucrative Russian government catering contracts.

A Soviet-era prisoner convicted of robbery, he branched out into troll farms and built his mercenary army, which amid the war in Ukraine recruited tens of thousands of jail inmates, offering them a pardon if they stayed alive at the front line for six months.

An earlier leak on Prigozhin since his armed mutiny saw how he kept a cupboard full of wigs at his mansion.

He used the wigs and fake beards for disguises in Africa and the Middle East as he furthered Putin’s interests and deployed Wagner forces.

One disguise showed him as an Employee of the Ministry of Defence in Sudan, another as an assistant diplomat from Abu Dhabi.

In a third he was mocked up as a Senior Lieutenant from Benghazi in Libya.

The versatile Prigozhin – whose Wagner forces have been used in many countries – also posed as a colonel from Tripoli, a ‘merchant from Syria’, and a field commander named Mohammed.