Marks & Spencer remains committed to opening a new store in Bradford’s £320 million Westfield retail development when it goes ahead.

This is in spite of announcing its worst trading results for a decade with like-for-like sales over the Christmas period down by seven per cent compared with 2007.

In a bid to cut costs by £200 million, M&S is to axe 1,200 staff and close 27 stores, manly smaller food outlets, none of them locally. The only Yorkshire store destined for closure is in Ripon.

A company spokesman said the trading downturn and closure plans would not affect any stores not named nor any proposed store developments.

Neither did it have any impact on the company’s plans for a key distribution centre at Rooley Lane, Bradford, although last year M&S indicated the time-scale for this development was being reviewed.

The spokesman confirmed that M&S was still scheduled to become an anchor tenant at the eagerly-awaited Westfield development.

Australian-based Westfield has invested more than £50 million in the Bradford development site on Broadway but has delayed construction due to the economic downturn. A campaign to attract more tenants continues.

M&S, along with Debenhams and Next which have also committed to taking significant space, form the cornerstone of the development on Broadway.

As and when the mall is built it will mark a return to Bradford by Debenhams after more than 30 years. The high street chain owned the former Busby’s department store on Manningham Lane.

Marks & Spencer’s like-for-like sales were down 7.1 per cent in the 13 weeks to December 27, its biggest sales collapse since July-September 1999, despite heavy price cutting in the run-up to Christmas.

There was more high street gloom as electrical retailer Miller Brothers, which once had a store in Bradford city centre, was put into administration.

Another victim of the spending slump is historic womenswear company Viyella, which was founded in 1784. It has called in the administrators.

The company has annual sales of about £30 million and its retail operations include 40 stores, including one in Ilkley.

Viyella, which employs 450 people, expressed the hope that the administrators would be able to sell the business quickly to protect jobs.

Chocolate retailer Thorntons blamed the drop in the number of shoppers on Britain’s high streets in the run-up to Christmas for melting sales in its stores.

The company said it had seen total sales decline 2.3 per cent in the 12 weeks to December 27, to £77.6 million.