The PwC joint administrators made 268 staff across several head office and back-office roles redundant on Monday and furloughed a further 1,669 store employees yesterday.

Laura Ashley fell into administration on March 17, blaming the spread of coronavirus for hampering sales, and PwC joint administrators Robert Lewis and Zelf Hussain were appointed.

Lewis and Zelf said the 1,669 furloughed store employees would be placed on the government’s coronavirus job retention scheme – under which staff are paid 80% of their salary up to £2,500 by the government.