// One pint of milk could soon cost £1, Iceland managing director Richard Walker says
// Speaking to the BBC Walker said price rises are “worse for those struggling the most and it will get worse as well”
Iceland managing director Richard Walker has said a pint of milk could soon cost £1, as food inflation soared to a record 11.6% last month.
The boss said he doesn’t know whether the retailer’s current 89p price for a pint of milk can be kept under a pound, but is “working day and night” to quell price rises.
Walker spoke on Amol Rajan’s podcast this week after joining a campaign to expand free school meals to children whose parents are on universal credit.
The food boss, who launched a bid to become a Conservative MP last month, admitted that “food insecurity is inevitably on the rise and it’s the households with kids who are most at risk”.
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Walker added: “There’s a lot of external pressures from the war in Ukraine to commodity price inflation to fuel to labour shortages to fertiliser shortages and everything else in between.”
“It will get worse… and it’s the households with kids who are most at risk”
Iceland boss Richard Walker tells @AmolRajan he is seeing cost prices from big brands which have yet to be passed on to consumers
Full interview: https://t.co/dTWvW87uY5 pic.twitter.com/M57rdfxEXJ
— BBC Radio 4 Today (@BBCr4today) November 2, 2022
During the podcast, he said price rises are “worse for those struggling the most and it will get worse as well”.
“I’ve got some cost prices currently on the table from some big branded suppliers that we haven’t stomached yet as a business, let alone have to pass on to our customers,” he said.
Walker admitted some products are “loss leaders that we have to sell because our customers are simply reliant on them”.
“Coming into winter we’ve got heating, we’ve got fuel, we’ve got food inflation,” he added.
Walker’s warning comes after the ONS found a range of 30 basic products had gone up by an average of 17%, while inflation has now reached 10.1%.
Walker, who is set to stage a bid to become a Tory MP, said he believed in “responsible capitalism” from businesses, where they accept “lower or no profits”.
He said: “We’ve got 800,000 kids living in poverty who don’t qualify for free school meals.
“The easiest way to reach them is through the Universal Credit scheme but also through businesses doing what they can, because many of those children are kids of my Iceland customers.”
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