Wilko slammed over ‘catalogue of failures’ that saw 12,000 lose jobs at retailer
Thousands of Wilko staff lost their “family” after the popular retailer went bust, leaving many of them without a job and a community they’ve held onto for so long.
Around 12,000 hard-working people have lost their jobs so close to Christmas following the closure of Wilko stores across the UK.
Former Wilko staff consistently spoke about feeling like a “family” to their union, prior to the chain going bust, GMB has said.
Nadine Houghton, national officer for trade union GMB, said: “I would be hard-pressed to find a group of members that so consistently spoke about the fact that Wilko felt like a family to them.
“At the period under the previous family ownership, before Lisa (Wilkinson) became a majority owner, members describe a period of good pay and conditions, feeling respected … they were trusted.”
She told MPs: “The reality is that 12,000 hard-working people lost their jobs as a result of these catalogues of failures.
“That multi-generational family that was part of Wilko really is something that I hadn’t heard at any other employer that I deal with.”
Former Wilko chair Lisa Wilkinson has said that Liz Truss’s mini-budget was one of the contributing factors that led to the collapse of the retailer.
Speaking to MPs on the Business and Trade Committee, she said the company was in the middle of negotiating a new loan arrangement when the mini-budget caused interest rates to soar.
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