Thousands are hired for immediate start

SUPERMARKETS have created tens of thousands of temporary jobs to meet increasing demand for food.

In the last three days, Tesco, Aldi, Asda, Sainsbury’s, Co-op, Lidl and Morrisons have all listed jobs, with many aimed at the estimated 500,000 pub, bar and sales staff who have found themselves unemployed.

The pandemic has put tens of thousands of jobs at risk, but supermarkets have pledged to create as many as 45,000 new jobs between them – with

Tesco alone announcing that it will recruit 20,000 temporary workers for at least the next 12 weeks.

With more than 7,000 vacancies on its website, Tesco has marked many of the newest roles as “immediate start”.

Tracy Landu, a university student, wrote on Twitter that she applied for one of the new jobs at the store at 7pm on Friday – and by 10pm, had received a call from the hiring manager asking her to work the next day.

She said: “If you’re finding yourself in a compromising job situation, don’t hesitate to apply. There’s no shame, we’re all trying to make a living out here.” She said the application process consisted of just a short phone interview. Elsewhere, Asda and Co-op have created 5,000 new roles each.

Asda says it is working with 20 national firms that are slashing roles, to take on their staff. And Co-op has promised to simplify its recruitment process to get staff working quickly.

Lidl, which is creating 2,500 new jobs, wants staff to start immediately on four-week temporary contracts.

Aldi is advertising for 4,000 new permanent roles, and 5,000 temporary ones, to start immediately, while Sainsbury’s is calling on its unspecified number of potential applicants to “support us in feeding the nation”.