Bonuses slashed as Marks makes £1bn

The company's 62,000 customer assistants - who gained up to £500 last time - will see payouts fall by half to a maximum of £250.

Chief executive Sir Stuart Rose - who received a total bonus of £2.6 million last year - will gain no extra payout at all after the group missed internal targets, details of which were not disclosed.

M&S's staff pot of £16.8 million is a fraction of last year's record £91 million windfall. Only head office staff working on the better-performing online and international operation will be in line for any payouts.

The gloom for staff came despite the best profit performance for 10 years, although City analysts expect this to fall to around £925 million next year in a darkening retail climate.

Collins Stewart's Rob Mann said: "Although the headline numbers will no doubt be taken positively, this set of results is delaying the inevitable."

Shares in M&S barely moved despite the company beating market forecasts of £989 million by £18 million.

Sir Stuart - who has led the turnaround of the business since 2004 - said trading since the end of March had been "mixed", with sales suffering in April's downpours before recovering with better weather earlier this month.

The M&S chief remains cautious over consumer sentiment, although the group still intends to spend up to £900 million on its stores this year. The company said it now has more than 21 million customers shopping in its stores every week, 400,000 ahead of the previous year.

Sir Stuart added the earlier Easter and poor weather had led to volatile trading conditions, making it hard to pick underlying trends. "We are all finding it very difficult to read the tea leaves," he added.