Ex-policeman and shopping pioneer Bill Starkey dies

Tributes were today paid to a former policeman who became the youngest ever CID officer in Staffordshire in the 1940s.

Bill Starkey, who was just 19 when he was made an officer, has died aged 90. Mr Starkey, a former Wolverhampton Grammar School pupil, joined the police after leaving school.

His daughter Christine Chapman paid tribute to her father, who was also instrumental in introducing self-service to supermarkets in the UK.

Mr Starkey left the Midlands when he left the police to join the Army. He attended officer training at The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in Surrey where he won the sword of honour and was commissioned into the Reconnaissance Corps.

He was invalided out of the army in 1945 and joined the National Cash Register Company and travelled to America to learn about marketing and self-service.

He was one of the pioneers of the concept of supermarket-style shopping working alongside Jack Cohen opening the first Tesco supermarket in 1956.

He also joined Litton Industries becoming senior vice-president until his retirement in 1978 when he and his wife Hilda moved to Sandbanks in Dorset.

Mr Starkey was also awarded the Freedom of the City of London in 1978 in recognition of his services to the city and to marketing.

He lived in Sandbanks with his wife, a former police officer during the Second World War, until her death in 1995. He then moved to the Isle of Man where he died in hospital.

Mrs Chapman, a funeral director in Surrey, said: "Dad enjoyed his work and all his other projects."

He leaves three grandsons and one great-grandson.