BARRATTS could be the next shop to disappear from St Helier after the footwear chain fell into administration.
Twelve workers at the King Street store are now fearing for their jobs following an announcement yesterday that the firm, and sister chain PriceLess Shoes, had been placed into the hands of administrators from Deloitte. Almost 5,500 jobs are at risk across the firms’ 400 shops.
Deloitte said that all stores will remain open and continue trading as normal as it tries to rescue the two firms.
The collapse of Barratts, which employs six full-time and six part-time staff in Jersey, and a further ten in Guernsey, has piled more pressure on the States to push through redundancy laws which will guarantee compensation to Islanders if their firm goes out of business.
Only four weeks ago, 84 staff at the Woolworths store in King Street were denied redundancy payments because, unlike the UK, Jersey does not have a statutory compensation scheme. The staff have spent the last three weeks campaigning for the introduction of a redundancy payment scheme.
• Picture: Barratts Jersey store in King Street which employs six full-time and six part-time staff. Picture by Rob Currie (00614076)
