Morrisons announces which of its 11 stores face closure

The store, next to The Hawthorns home of West Bromwich Albion, is facing the axe after the under-pressure supermarket chain announced it was planning to shut several large outlets across the UK.

“What I find particularly galling is that Tyldesley centre no longer has a butcher, greengrocer or fishmonger and local people believe that Morrisons has played a significant role in driving these former businesses out of town”.

The closure plan was revealed as the Yorkshire-based supermarket chain posted half-year results showing falling sales and profits.

One of Wearside’s Morrisons shops is among those which could close.

A spokesman for Morrisons confirmed the store in Kidderminster will not be closing.

Mr Potts said: “With great regret we are proposing to close 11 supermarkets”.

Stores in Shildon, County Durham and Castletown in Sunderland are among the affected stores to close as part of its turnaround plan, it has been reported.

Pre-tax profits for the six months to August 2 2015 fell 47% to £126m, while like-for-like sales for the period dropped 2.7% compared with the same period previous year.

Hundreds of staff around the region had been forced to wait days to hear if their branch was among the 11 which Morrisons said last week would be closed.

Earlier this year, Morrisons had fired Dalton Philips and appointed David Potts as CEO. “This is a hard decision but one which we can not see any way through to make those stores viable”, Potts said in the group’s interim statement last week.