Tesco staff share £220m bonus

Tesco workers have been rewarded for a £2bn (€2.9bn) year of profits by sharing £220m (€321.4m) in what is believed to be the UK’s biggest staff bonus.

The pay-out – disclosed in Tesco’s annual report published today – covered around 150,000 staff and included incentive bonuses and share schemes.

It also emerged that chief executive Sir Terry Leahy earned £3.2m (€4.7m) for helping the UK’s biggest supermarket chain to lift profits 20% in the last financial year to £2.03bn (€3bn).

His total package compared with £2.98m (€4.3m) a year earlier and included a basic salary of just over £1m (€1.5m). He also received more than one million share options worth the equivalent of £3m (€4.4m) in today’s market.

Overall, the Tesco board received £12.8m (€18.7m) in pay and bonuses in the last financial year, down on last time’s £16.9m (€24.7m) following the departure of two long-serving directors.

Tesco chairman David Reid said: “As always, our success is down to the hard work and skill of the whole Tesco team. I am delighted that once again all staff are sharing in this success.”

Tesco said it believed the bonus payout of £220m (€321.4m) was a record for a UK company.