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Keep Sunday Special have urged MPs not to be taken in by reports that government plans to devolve Sunday trading decisions to local authorities will only be applied to high streets.

While Mr Lewis has suggested in an article in the Telegraph that there had been a ‘last minute change’ to the plans which will benefit town centres over out of town locations, there are in fact no clauses in the Enterprise Bill that ensure or even promote the use of these new powers for high street or town centre locations.

ACS has called on MPs to reject an amendment tabled in the Enterprise Bill on Sunday Trading that will damage the economy and devastate small shops.

Comments made by Chancellor George Osborne about the link between online shopping and Sunday trading have been shown to be wrong and misguided by new polling.

Polling of over 2,000 consumers in January 2016 showed that two thirds of consumers had shopped online in January but not a single person identified Sunday trading hours as a reason why they shopped online instead of on the high street. The Chancellor is the latest of a number of government ministers to make the false link between Sunday trading laws and the growth of internet shopping.

Hundreds of concerned retailers, shopworkers and consumers gathered on Monday afternoon in a mass lobby of Parliament to oppose plans to remove Sunday trading laws.

The mass lobby, organised by campaign group Keep Sunday Special, called on MPs from pivotal constituencies in the Sunday trading debate to hear from retailers, shopworkers, faith groups and industry experts on the damage that changes to Sunday trading rules will do to the UK economy and society.

HMRC have published a consultation on the costs and benefits of introducing tobacco licensing for all parts of the supply chain including retailers. The Chancellor announced this consultation would take place at his Autumn Financial Statement. The UK Government is a signatory of the World Health Organisation Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC) and is therefore obliged to explore the extent to which tobacco licensing is appropriate in the tobacco supply chain.

A group of organisations have issued Government with notice to legally challenge their decision to press ahead with proposals to change Sunday trading regulations.

The Government has been issued with a letter before action from the Keep Sunday Special group, setting out plans for a future Judicial Review on the proposals to devolve Sunday trading regulations to local authorities. The letter argues that the Government has not carried out a genuine, unbiased consultation process.

The key elements raised in the letter include:

Mars Chocolate UK has taken the precautionary step of recalling products produced in the Netherlands that possibly contain pieces of plastic. Other products are being recalled in Europe which have not been distributed via the Mars UK distribution route. 

The UK recall from consumers concerns only the products below, with the stated ‘best before’ dates, which were manufactured in the Netherlands and distributed in the UK.

ACS has branded a report published today by Grant Shapps MP as partial, unconvincing and based on old data that has already been discredited during the government’s consultation on this issue. The report (http://www.shapps.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Sunday-Trading-for-the…) argues for extending Sunday trading hours.

ACS (the Association of Convenience Stores) is encouraging retailers to take advantage of a new platform to allow them to train their staff on Assured Advice.

The platform, which has been developed by online learning company Bolt, will allow any ACS member to sign up to the Assured Advice scheme and benefit from both the assurance of the guides and industry leading training modules for staff members.

Plans to reform Sunday trading will not address the problems of high streets and make the Government the enemy of entrepreneurial businesses.

The Government has finally set out its stall on Sunday trading, releasing its response to the consultation after months of waiting, alongside amendments to the Enterprise Bill designed to give powers to local authorities to set Sunday trading hours as they see fit.