Budget 2026: Sainsbury’s boss urges Labour to tackle Neets crisis

The boss of Sainsbury’s has urged the government to tackle the UK’s youth unemployment crisis, as he hit out at previous hikes to the cost of hiring workers. Simon Roberts, chief executive of the UK’s second-largest grocer, said John Healey must “focus on doing the right thing for young people” at next week’s Budget. In recent weeks, retail and hospitality bosses pledged to provide thousands of work opportunities to stem the rising number of young people who are not in education, employment or training (Neet). Sainsbury’s, which has promised to create 10,000 work experience opportunities for Neets, said the government must match businesses’ commitments by ruling out further costs for firms. Roberts told reporters: “It s so important that we don t see any repeat of what we ve seen in previous budgets, particularly the impact on the tax on employing people through national insurance, or any other costs in the industry that are going to cause food inflation. “Now there