Asda chair Allan Leighton says government ‘more and more difficult’ to deal with

Asda chair Allan Leighton said businesses are increasingly facing obstacles to growth which are ‘not of their own making’ as he criticised government policies

The chair of supermarket giant Asda has said that the government has become “more and more difficult” to work with and that policy-driven pressures on business have ballooned in recent decades.

Allan Leighton, Asda’s chair, suggested businesses are increasingly encountering barriers to growth which are “not of their own making”.

At Tuesday’s spring statement the Chancellor maintained the UK economy “is growing” but retailers responded by claiming decisions taken by Labour are undermining their capacity to expand.

Speaking at the Retail Week x The Grocer conference on Tuesday, Leighton said: “Politics and government have a much more bigger impact on what happens today than they did.

“You know, I think in that period of time, most of government was pretty business-friendly, and over a period of time that’s got, I think, more and more difficult,” he said, as reported by The Telegraph and by City AM.

Asda was acquired by US retailer Walmart for £6.7bn in 1999, before being purchased by the billionaire Issa brothers and British equity firm TDR Capital in 2021, with Walmart maintaining an equity stake and a board seat.

Leighton formerly ran Leeds-based Asda in the 1990s before rejoining the supermarket in 2024, following spells at The Co-op, Pandora and Brewdog.

Throughout his initial tenure at Asda the Tony Blair-led Labour Party went “out of their way to try to engage with business,” he said, whilst the climate facing business under today’s Labour government is “less helpful”. “In the end, you have to deal with it, which is why I don’t complain about it,” he said.

Retail and hospitality bosses suggested Rachel Reeves’ growth objectives are encouraging but are being hampered by government policy – including business rates and workers’ rights reforms – which make it harder for them to recruit.

Retailers have faced mounting employment costs in recent months and are now being compelled to adjust to Labour’s new workers’ rights reforms, which trade bodies have cautioned could push employers to reduce hiring.

Growing youth unemployment is becoming an escalating worry for business leaders, as the figure of young people not in education, employment or training approaches one million. The chief executive of bakery chain Greggs stated on Tuesday she was concerned by the scale of youth joblessness, describing getting young people into work as “key to the success of a future growing economy”.