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The boss of Currys, the UK’s biggest electrical goods retailer, has urged the government not to increases taxes on retailers this year, saying it would damage investment and force prices to rise.

Alex Baldock, the retailer’s chief executive, said: “We urge government not to make a further contribution to the tax burden as that would further dampen investment and increase prices in an inflationary way.

“I would urge government to think very carefully before making the situation worse.”

Baldock’s comments come after the boss of Sainsbury’s, Simon Roberts, also said this week that the government should be wary of loading retailers with more tax after the “high impact”, particularly on jobs, of raising national insurance costs this year.

The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, is widely expected to raise fresh funds in her autumn budget as she attempts to fix public services and grow the economy while meeting her fiscal rules and dealing with the fallout from the government’s U-turn on welfare cuts.

Keir Starmer repeated his support for Reeves on Thursday morning, after speculation over her future injected panic into financial markets on Wednesday.

Baldock said Currys – which has about 300 stores in the UK – and other retailers were already holding back on hiring more staff because of an increase in employers’ national insurance contributions and the rise in the “national living wage” in April. He said consumer confidence was on an improving trend but still down on a year ago.

Despite this, the retailer reported a 37% jump in pre-tax profits to £162m in the year to 3 May and resumed dividend payments to shareholders after a two-year pause. Group sales rose 3% to £8.7bn.

Currys increased sales at established UK stores by 6%, helped by a 12% rise in sales of services including repairs, financing and mobile subscriptions.

Sales of laptops and mobile phones were bolstered by demand for AI-enabled gadgets. Sales were also helped as customers began replacing laptops bought five years ago when the onset of the Covid pandemic forced Britons to begin working from home, triggering a boom in computer sales.

Baldock said the wider electrical goods market had been flat in the UK and there were concerns about cheap electricals being dumped on online marketplaces amid new taxes on imports of such goods to the US and planned changes in the EU.

Baldock said that dumping did not directly affect Currys, which mostly sells larger, more expensive items, but he welcomed the government’s promise that it would look at the so-called de minimis rules, which allow tax breaks on low value goods sent directly to consumers. He said changes should be made with “some urgency”.

In the UK, the threshold for import duty is £135, and items valued at £39 or less also do not attract import VAT.

Onboard Le Commandant Charcot, an imposing 150-metre icebreaker ship, cruise company Ponant has added an unexpected visitor to the guest list. Operated by SAS Pôle Air, Airbus’ H125 is becoming an invaluable partner on the ship’s journey around the Polar regions, acting as a workhorse for a variety of missions to support the crew in their tasks. Olivier Mabille, helicopter pilot for SAS Pôle Air, shares his insights on what makes the H125 a true pioneer on the ice. 

As part of the expedition, the H125’s main mission is to ensure safe navigation in the ice for the Commandant Charcot. “Before the ship reaches new ice to break, the helicopter performs a reconnaissance mission to sound out whether it’s safe to progress on the planned itinerary,” says Olivier Mabille. The helicopter also serves for medical evacuations of passengers and crew members, from the ice towards the boat or from the latter to reach an airport or a land base. In addition to contributing to saving human lives, the H125 was recently mobilised as part of scientific missions to check the evolution of animal species in the region.

Mabille recounts an impressive example of this: “We usually receive international scientific teams on Le Commandant Charcot, who come to collect data in the Arctic and Antarctica. Some time ago, a team of scientists was trying to spot a colony of emperor penguins which needed to be updated from scientific surveys. With the help of the H125, we managed to track down the new location of this colony, which was actually doing quite well.”

A singular way to team up

In addition to its demonstrated capabilities for essential missions, the H125 also provides an unrivalled advantage for the ship’s crew, thanks to its high degree of adaptability and agility. “It is a helicopter which is very reliable and very powerful and has strong assets, like an autopilot, a large glass cockpit navigation display and advanced means of communication,” explains Mabille. When navigating icy environments where weather conditions can easily become unpredictable and flight ceilings are limited to protect natural surroundings, the H125 also benefits from the most modern equipment to ensure the highest levels of safety. Mabille explains: “The H125 is ideally suited for polar missions. We operate at very low temperatures in a saline environment, and we regularly have to land on the ice or in the mountains. It is the perfect tool for us, and we are very happy and proud to be able to operate this rotorcraft in these latitudes.” 

A testament to the added value of the helicopter for polar missions, Mabille just took delivery of a new H125. “This rotorcraft will leave for Stockholm, where the ship will make a stopover, and from there on, we will journey towards the Arctic to start operations in Greenland around April. It’s a really exciting step to start preparing for new adventures with the H125.”

From the three poles onward

When looking back on his most striking flights with the helicopter, Mabille has difficulty actually picking one. “We’ve had so many opportunities to fly over exceptional landscapes, particularly in Greenland, under a magnificent sun with the Inuit populations in dog sleds, hunting or fishing under the helicopter. In Antarctica, we saw Tabular icebergs the size of certain French departments, and we even flew over the Erebus volcano.” But amongst recent memorable experiences he took part in, Mabille shares the story of three flights that took the crew over three different poles in five days. The crew first passed the geographic North Pole, when leaving Alaska (US) to reach Svalbard, an archipelago located to the north of Norway. Two days later, the H125 then made its way toward the magnetic pole, which gathers the Earth’s magnetic field. “And that’s when the H125 made a true first,” highlights Mabille. “The day after, reaching the pole of inaccessibility: the point in the Arctic Ocean that is the furthest from any land. That is a truly extraordinary event in the life of a pilot, and the H125 was definitely up to the task.” 

 Hear Olivier Mabille recount his incredible wildlife discovery with the Airbus H125: