RETAIL giant Marks & Spencer has been fined £1million for failing to protect customers, staff and workers from potential exposure to asbestos during refurbishment at one of its stores.

The management was more concerned about the works being ‘unsightly’ and ‘interfering with the shopping experience’ of customers than the cancer-causing material, Bournemouth Crown Court heard.

Judge Christopher Harvey Clark QC said the tension between health and safety and profit had caused the ‘lamentable problems’ at Reading which had led to ceiling material, possibly containing asbestos, falling to the shop floor when it was open.

Judge Clark saide: “The response from Marks & Spencer was, in effect, to turn a blind eye to what was happening.”

He added: “It was already costing the company too much money.”

“There was systemic failure on behalf of M&S management. There has been no hint of a proper full apology for what happened.”

He said that people who visited the store during the work ‘have a right to be anxious as to whether they have breathed in asbestos fibres’.

The work at Reading was part of a £1.3billion refurbishment of Marks & Spencer stores UK-wide, the court heard.

M&S employed contractors who removed asbestos present in ceiling tiles and elsewhere during the work at the store in Reading and also at Bournemouth, between 2006 and 2007.

The three-month trial at Winchester Crown Court was told M&S guidance on asbestos removal was not fully followed by the contractors during the major refurbishments but M&S had a ‘duty of care’ to ensure the work was carried out safely.

The store was found guilty in July of two charges under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 of failing to ensure the health and safety of its staff and others at the Reading store.

It was fined £500,000 for each offence.

Willmott Dixon Construction Ltd, of Hertfordshire, was found guilty of contravening the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 at the Bournemouth store.

And Manchester-based company PA Realisations Ltd (formerly Pectel Ltd), was found guilty of contravening asbestos regulations at Reading. At an earlier hearing, Styles & Wood Limited, of Manchester Road, Altrincham, Cheshire, pleaded guilty to contravening the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 at Reading.

Nicholas Haggan QC for M&S said that there was no evidence of ‘significant’ amounts of asbestos contamination at the stores. M&S was said to have made £500million of taxable profits within the last year.