Morrisons has called on the Competition Commission to change the focus of its investigation and concentrate on liberalising the planning laws so the industry can be opened up to greater competition. Managing director John Dowd said the company was constantly looking for new expansion opportunities. His comments come in the wake of record breaking sales and profits for the company in the last year. Full year pretax profits were £189.2m, an increase of 11.1%. Turnover for the full year was £2,970.1m, an increase of 17.2%. Dowd put the improvement down to "no nonsense marketing and no silly gimmicks." "Morrisons is very much a what you see is what you get supermarket concept, with no little bits of plastic and loyalty cards." The arrival of Wal-Mart as the parent of Asda could only be regarded as healthy competition, he added. "We have been in competition with Asda for years already. We are good street fighters," said Dowd. The company plans to create 5,000 jobs over the next two years with new store openings. This year it opened stores in Crewe, Leeds, Kettering and Wellingborough and replacements of existing stores will open in Newcastle, Bradford and St Helens. Three former Somerfield stores in East Dereham in Norfolk, Hyde and Spalding will begin trading as Morrisons by the end of this month. A fourth store, also in Spalding, is undergoing major redevelopment. A former Co-operative store in Rhyl will reopen as Morrisons after extensive refurbishment. Next year new stores are planned in Jarrow, Small Heath in Birmingham, Risca and Barry in South Wales, King's Lynn and Bradford. The 22,000 workers at Morrisons will share in the company's success with profit related pay awards of £9.9m, 10% higher than last year. {{NEWS }}

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