The Leekes Retail & Leisure Group and The Welsh Government’s Economic Contract

The Leekes Retail & Leisure Group are pleased to support the Welsh Government’s Economic Contract initiative which requires businesses to demonstrate their commitment to growth, fair work, employee health & skills and reducing their carbon footprint.

There are a number of areas where we can demonstrate the support the Group gives to the aims of Welsh Government to develop businesses to meet the needs to today and to prepare for the challenges and opportunities of the future which include:

• The Group, which operates across a number of industries and locations including:
• Six retail stores trading across over 67,000 square metres.
• A 143 bedroom hotel.
• Two championship golf courses.
• A leisure club and spa.
• A wedding venue based in a Grade 1 listed castle.
• A distillery and bottling production facility is headquartered in Rhondda Cynon Taf, South Wales just a few miles from the location of the first premises used by the business when it was established in 1897.

• The Group has over 850 employees and regularly utilise over 125 subcontractors to carry out work on its behalf.
• We actively endeavour to utilise local Welsh businesses wherever possible for the supply of products and services to the Group.
• Over 80% of the Group’s employees are based within Wales, many working in the same county that they live in.
• The Group prides itself on the large number within the team who have worked for the Company over an extended length of time. There are currently 80 members of staff (over 10% of the workforce) with over 25 years service within the business, evidencing sustainable employment opportunities.
• The Company operates a family friendly policy, where flexible and part-time working requests are accommodated where ever possible.
• The Company’s recruitment and career development strategy ensures that everyone regardless of background, race, ethnicity or gender have equal opportunities.
• The breadth of career opportunities has enabled the company to create a business environment that attracts and retains a good balance of men (49%) and woman (51%).
• All new vacancies are advertised internally to ensure that all of the team are given the opportunity to develop and progress their careers.
• Performance Development Reviews are carried out across the business on an annual basis to ensure that every member of the team is given the opportunity to develop their skills and their careers.
• The Directors hold six monthly meetings with all employees to update them on the business operation, the future plans and to answer any questions personally.
• Employees are encouraged to participate in health and safety committee meetings which are held in each site on a monthly basis. These meetings cover areas such as training, promoting health and mental well being within the business and ensuring that we are operating in a safe environment.
• The Group is enrolled in the Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme. We survey all of our properties on a regular basis to identify areas of investment that can help us reduce our energy consumption and reduce our carbon footprint.  Completed projects have included migration to LED lighting, replacing inefficient heating and cooling systems with more efficient technology, investments in improved insulation, the implementation of building energy management systems to automate energy savings. 
• The Company reviews energy use on a monthly basis to identify, investigate and address any anomalous usage. 
• The Group is actively reviewing its fleet of vehicles investing in a number of electric vehicles and charging infrastructure. 
• Where the Group undertakes development works to our properties, we look to make further investment in energy saving technologies, as an example we have plans to introduce solar PV to a number of sites in the immediate future.
• The Company heavily invests in technology with a large internal software development team that work on process automation on an ongoing basis. Some of the areas of focus in recent times include automated invoice scanning and processing, paperless processing of customer orders and automated customer communication. 
• The Group continues to invest in the multiple websites we operate across our areas of operation  and are undertaking a £200,000 project migrating our transactional Leekes Retail website to a new platform offering a series of enhanced features to better serve our customers including a customer portal that enables customers to track their orders, make balance payments and book deliveries reducing the requirement for staff intervention and empowering the customer to engage with our business at their own convenience.

Gender Pay Gap

Leekes Retail is a family owned and operated retail business with a 125 year history trading across multiple locations in South Wales, the West of England and the Midlands. Led by our Managing Director, Emma Leeke, we pride ourselves in supplying quality products and excellent levels of service, covering everything you need for your home from kitchens & bathrooms to furniture and all the finishing touches.

We have a strong employee led brand with exciting employment opportunities for multiple professional disciplines and for colleagues looking to work full or flexible and reduced hours. This is evidenced by excellent retention rates as our colleagues recognise that they work within a business that is inclusive, fair, respectful and appreciative of all employees.

Our recruitment and career development strategy ensures that everyone, regardless of their background, race, ethnicity or gender have equal opportunities.

The business operates with multiple disciplines incorporating a range of professional skills such as IT, Finance, Marketing, Sales, Visual Merchandising, Buying, Human Resources, Warehousing & Logistics and Construction.

Our breath of professional career opportunities has enabled us to create a business environment that attracts and retains a good balance of men and woman across the group and the ratio is 49.6% male employees and 50.4% female employees.

We regularly monitor remuneration by role to ensure that pay rates are governed solely by job position and not gender. Senior Management and Line Management roles across the group are well spilt between male and female and have equal salary, bonus & commission criteria. Female staff operating in the same role as male colleagues receive the same remuneration package.

On the 23^rd March 2020 our business as a non- essential retailer locked down in line with Government direction and during April 2021 we operating with much of the business closed.

From a total of 488 staff that were on the payroll in April 2021 only 151 staff were relevant full pay employees. The remaining staff received furlough payments.

The 151 relevant full pay employees performed in areas critical to business continuity covering operations such as finance, distribution, customer service and payroll and store staff where departments were able to trade such as our building team or to support the on-line operation.

As such the reported pay gap, and pay quartile figures are once again not an accurate representation of our business as the data is adversely affected by the pandemic and represents a smaller sample of employees. The majority of staff are not included in the data as they are not classified as relevant full pay employees for the period under review.

 

Pay Gap

The data for the pay gap and pay quartiles reports covers 151 full pay relevant employees, 69 females and 82 males;

Mean females earnings are 26.88% lower than males

Median female earnings are 6% lower than males

 

Pay Gap Bonus Figures

The pay gap bonus figures represents the earnings over a 12 month period for 123 male and 79 female employees.

 

Mean female bonus payments are 30.75% lower than males

Median female salaries are 55.81% lower than males

Slavery and Human Trafficking Statement 2021/22– for the year ending 31.03.2022

At Leekes, we recognise that we should endeavour to ensure that we have a positive impact on the working conditions of those working directly or indirectly for our business.

We try to ensure that our suppliers share our vision of a fair and safe working conditions.

Organisation's structure

The company's principal activities are in the retail sector through the operation of home department stores. We are a part of the Leekes Leisure and Retail Group, and our ultimate parent company is J.H. Leeke and Sons Limited. J.H. Leeke and Sons Limited has its head office in Rhondda Cynon Taff, South Wales. The Group has 850 employees all based in England and Wales.

Organisation's structure

We are committed to trying to ensure that there is no modern slavery or human trafficking in our supply chains or in any part of our business. Our Anti-Slavery Policy reflects our commitment to acting ethically and with integrity in all our business relationships and to implementing and enforcing effective systems and controls to try to ensure slavery and human trafficking is not taking place anywhere in our supply chain.

We have in place systems to:

• Identify and assess potential risk areas in our supply chain.
• Mitigate the risk of slavery and human trafficking occurring in our supply chain.
• Monitor potential risk areas in our supply chain.

The Leekes Supplier Code of Conduct covers our minimum requirements in these areas and all our suppliers, and their supply chain, are asked to confirm their adherence to our standards.

Leekes Supplier Code of Conduct

All of our suppliers are asked to confirm their adherence to the following standards:

1. Child Labour
   

   Child labour MUST NOT BE used by a supplier. A child is defined as any person under the age at which the local minimum age law stipulates for work or mandatory schooling. As a general rule this would be anyone under fifteen years of age.

2. Slavery, Forced, Bonded* or Involuntary Labour
   

   * Bonded Labour, e.g. a person becomes a bonded labourer when their labour is demanded as a means of repayment for a loan. There MUST NOT BE any slavery, forced, bonded or involuntary labour in use across a supplier’s operation. To ensure compliance, workers should have the legal right to work at the premises, to leave the premises at the end of their working day and the freedom to terminate employment at any time in accordance with the agreed notice period.

3. Human Trafficking and Exploitation
   

   There MUST NOT BE any labour who could be considered to have been subject to Human Trafficking. To ensure compliance, workers cannot be recruited through a person who arranges or facilitates the travel of another person with a view to that person being exploited. It is irrelevant whether that person has consented to travel.

4. Health and Safety Hazards
   

   Workers MUST BE prevented from exposure to any health and safety hazards that are likely to pose an immediate risk of causing death, permanent injury or illness.

5. Working Hours
   

   A reliable system for recording working hours and wages for each individual employed MUST BE in place within a supplier and these should be available for audit.

6. Business Ethics
   

   There MUST NOT BE any form of bribery offered or used in relation to the Leekes business.

We have zero tolerance to slavery and human trafficking. To ensure all those in our supply chain and contractors comply with our values we reserve the right to request access to our suppliers manufacturing facilities at any time for members of our Buying Team or our representatives to check compliance with the Leekes Supplier Code of Conduct.

This statement is made pursuant to section 54(1) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and constitutes our slavery and human trafficking statement for the financial year ending 31st March 2022. It was approved by the board on 22nd September 2022.

Emma Leeke
Managing Director
Leekes Limited