Concern for Suffolk jobs as John Lewis Partnership tells staff of 1,000 redundancies across department stores and Waitrose

The John Lewis Partnership (JLP) has told staff it is proposing around 1,000 redundancies across its department stores and Waitrose supermarkets.

The company, which has supermarkets in Newmarket, Bury St Edmunds, Sudbury, Ipswich and Saxmundham as well as petrol station concessions in Woodbridge and Barton Mills, said the shake-up will take place as part of a simplification of store management.

It comes after a raft of recent job cuts, which included the closure of eight John Lewis stores earlier this year.

The company currently operates 331 Waitrose stores and 34 John Lewis shops across the UK.

JLP has pushed forward with the raft of cuts in a bid to meet its target of £300 million in savings by 2022.

Earlier this month, the partnership announced plans to build 10,000 rental homes over the next few years in a bid to return to profit by diversifying its operations.

JLP added that it will support employees who wish to stay in the business in finding new roles and will seek to minimise compulsory redundancies through voluntary redundancy and severance options.

A John Lewis Partnership spokesman said: “We have announced to our partners our intention to simplify our management structures in Waitrose and John Lewis stores, which will allow us to reinvest in what matters most to our customers.”

Earlier this year, the retailer also said it expects its financials to get worse over the current financial year as it continues its shake-up and warned staff they are not expected to receive a bonus until 2022-23.

Read more: All the latest news from Suffolk

Head to our business page for all of the latest news about businesses in Suffolk