00:00There seems to currently be an unending stream of high street stores and retailers closing their doors.
00:05I spoke to Joanne Thomas, General Secretary of Usdor, to find out more about the impact on workers and the economy.
00:11I started by asking her about job security for workers in this climate.
00:16I am really concerned about job security because this is a trend that's unfortunately been happening for a long time.
00:23And we've seen the loss of retail jobs for a number of years.
00:28And if I just give you some examples, last year in particular, we saw 37 shops close every single day, which equals 100,000 retail jobs being lost.
00:41So I think when you've got statistics like that, it concerns us.
00:44It concerns our members.
00:46But of course, it should concern everybody because it has a real negative impact on the economy in general as well.
00:52A lot of retailers are saying that the shift to online shopping is behind these changes.
00:56How do you think that that move is impacting traditional shop workers?
01:00I do think that it's had a huge impact on retail jobs because we are seeing a lot of people shop online.
01:09But I think one of the things that we're asking from the government is to make sure that retail is a key part of an industrial strategy.
01:18And that looks at different things like having fundamental reform on business rates.
01:25Retail currently pay 21% of all business rates.
01:29We want to make sure there's a much more of a level playing field just to make sure that if there is a shift, which we are seeing, that there's still equal opportunity for bricks and mortar retailers.
01:41With regard to that, with the sort of things that the government should do, automation and self-service technology are growing quite a lot, as well as what impact do you see it having?
01:49Do you think that there's any way in which it should be managed at all?
01:53Most certainly.
01:54AI automation is having a massive impact.
01:58Well, across the globe, this isn't something that's just happening to retail.
02:03So we're all, I think, coming to terms with the impact of AI and technology.
02:09But, of course, you see it in retail.
02:11Workers should be at the very forefront of any discussions and any decisions where AI is taking place because we want to protect jobs.
02:20We also want to make sure that, you know, this is something that benefits customers as well.
