‘Cut red tape from Sunday shops law’
Thursday 13th January 2011, 1:00PM GMT.
A REVIEW of Sunday trading laws should look at the bureaucracy surrounding the regulations, says a Bridge butcher who encountered major problems with red tape.
Charlie’s Family Butchers owner Charlie Le Poidevin (pictured) said delays in granting him a Sunday trading licence when he changed the name of his shop cost him more than £3,000 in lost trade.
Commerce and Employment Department said in its 2011 business plan that there would be a review of the legislation this year.
Mr Le Poidevin applied for a Sunday trading licence from the St Sampson’s constables when he took over the former Johns the Butchers shop late last year. But he had to wait more than a month for his application to be approved and could not open on a Sunday during that time.
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Am I missing something basic here? Who will meet the additional employment and operational costs if shops decide to trade 7 days a week?
As a simplistic example, let’s say I spend £10k per year on groceries for my family. If the shop(s) in which I buy the goods choose to operate for 7 days a week instead of 6 at present, they will inevitably incur increased operating costs (light, heat and particularly staff), but as far as I can see there are only two mechanisms they can use to recoup this additional expenditure – either increase market share (i.e. sell more goods) or raise prices on their current level of turnover. So will my £10k still buy me the same gorceries as at present, or will 7-day trading lead to price inflation and therefore mean I’m worse off?
While I entirely understand the potential benefits of 7-day trading, I am concerned that this could ultimately raise costs for the consumer. I am also unsure how, or indeed if, this could be regulated.
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Commerce and Employment appear to have a busy year ahead
Here’s one solution to lighten the load …. Get a red pen and write the word ‘REPEALED’ across every page of the Sunday Trading Laws
If such a bold step would cause too much anguish amongst those deputies who just couldn’t bear the thought of relieving themselves of a little bit of power in order to get off our backs for once they could always vote for plan B ….
SUSPEND the Sunday Trading Laws for an indeterminate period to see how things pan out
If rioting doesn’t break out in the streets,or if cruise ship passengers are comfortable with being able to spend up on a Sunday then hooray for freedom of choice
There will be those with honest and well meaning anti Sunday Trading views but can I remind them that a reversal / suspension of the law would NOT MAKE IT COMPULSORY for any trader to open
If Commerce and Employment want a starter for ten on how to go about suspending the law just look up The Dwellings Profits Tax ( Suspension of Law ) ( Guernsey ) Ordinance,2009
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@Jon I see your point, but the point being Sunday hasn’t restrictive sales laws to ensure business expenditure is limited to pass on savings, but rather because it’s a holy day. And one I don’t subscribe to.
But on your point, presuming a shop hires another member of staff, we have made more jobs, and if they don’t someone will have more money to spend within our economy. Your point would be valid if shoppers have a set shopping agenda, but I would bargain people are opportunistic in shopping habits as much as they stick to a set shopping list, and would adjust to these new laws and welcome the extra day of choice in which to do their shopping.
What we need is choice, and availability. Ultimately I would like a 24/7 Super Market with a clothes section, electrical section and a cafe. But I highly doubt we will ever see any of the big name supermarkets venture here without being diluted and turned into a veneered husk version of itself, with half the features and twice the price of the mainland ones, operated by a channel island wide trading company.
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Let the shops be open on Sundays. If the public do not want the shops open, they will not shop on sundays. Let the public decide, they will vote with their shopping pounds.
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Keep the Sunday trading laws we already have. Allowing town shops and large companys to open on the Sunday will force the smaller shops who rely on their Sunday trade out of business. The big shops won’t ale any extra profit anyway because they will have to employ more staff and say overheads for the extra day and the takings for 6 days will just be spread over 7 days, not ness taking more sales! I work on Sundays but i wouldn’t force staff to work
Like most would if they were open. I still appreciate local family values. :-)
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It’s not really just about letting the public decide. No matter whether the public want it or not, shops will be forced to open on Sundays or they will lose business to those competitors that do open.
Retail on the island is hard enough without adding to the cost, which will be felt hardest by the small independents.
Sunday opening will not generate extra business for most retail outlets, only those serving food and you don’t make a lot of profit on that. No-one will buy more clothes because the shops are open for 7 days, they will just become lazier with their time and spread their shopping trips over the full week rather than ensuring that they are fitted into the 6 days that are currently available.
We live in a small island where a trip to Town, the Bridge or the other shops takes hardly any time at all. Are the people really so deprived by having to ensure that they do not need a new pair of jeans on Sunday???
Keep the laws as they are, other than to tidy up some of the ambiguities about what is currently permitted on a Sunday.
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Terry L
The feared meltdown following the Sunday petrol sales appears to have abated
Griffin sends out a rather mixed message.He seems to be against Town shops opening on a Sunday because they will take the trade away from other shops which do open on a Sunday,and although he works on a Sunday he still appreciates local family values!
This is all about freedom of choice.I probably would not go out of my way to shop for non food items on a Sunday ( I think I’ve only filled up with petrol once )but if I need a small tub of wallpaper paste from B&Q or Quayside on a Sunday morning after Mass I really think it is an imposition for the law of the land to prevent me from making such a mundane purchase
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Sorry Terry and Griffin but these laws must be repealed. They are repressive, illiberal and totally out of keeping with the lives and lifestyles of most people in this day and age.
Ray, you are entirely correct. Nobody is calling for anything to be made compulsory and nobody is being forced to do anything. Every day the status quo brigade trot this one out. They did it with pubs and fuel stations and they were shown to be quite wrong when the ridiculous laws banning the sale of alcohol and motor fuel were done away with.
The only ones who are being forced to do something that they do not want to do are those retailers who want to open on Sundays but cannot under the current dog’s dinner legislation.
These retailers are being FORCED to stay closed when they want to open. And should it not be up to them (and their customers) to decide whether it is worth their while opening on Sundays or not?
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Martino – i doubt that there is a single retailer (petrol and food aside) who is being forced to stay closed against their wishes as you suggest. The Friquet wants to trade on Sundays because it has stolen a march on its competitors (or tried to). However, with a level playing field I do not see how Sunday trading benefits the retailer unless they sell items that people need to want to consume there and then. If they can all do it, they gain nothing but t hey all end up having higher overheads for the same aggregate sales.
You say that opening will be complusory, but in commercial terms it will be. If a shop stays shut on one of the two weekend shopping days, it will lose the loyalty of its customers. Shops will have to “keep up” whether they like it or not.
My view is that this is not the UK and we do not need it. The Guernsey lifestyle means that we can easily fit our chores into our daily lives and do not need to leave those chores to the weekend. And I say that as someone who works long hours. Anyone who says that they need to buy something on a Sunday that cannot already be bought should learn to think ahead a bit more.
Pandering to the whim of the lazy will just cost the retailers more, cause some small shops to close and increase pressure on prices. So how does that serve us as consumers?
The freedom of choice argument is a red herring. There are plenty of things that we could do if there was absolute freedom of choice, but which are not in the wider interests of the community.
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Sunday trading should be kept how it is, opening all shops would just make it like any other day.
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Terry Langlois
Well said and makes perfect sense.
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Surely the issue here is “Freedom of Choice” ?.
The laws here are so draconian that if I wanted to go and buy pornography ( I don’t I hasten to add ) I could without problem, however IF I was religious ( I am NOT ) and wanted to buy a bible I would be breaking the law. If I remember rightly it is also illegal to buy something like a plant pot on a Sunday but you can but a potted plant ( that instance may not be correct but it is something like that ).
If a shop wishes to open on a Sunday and they have the staff willing to work then no problem, no-one is forcing them to, most of the big supermarkets here employ staff on a Sunday anyway just to fill up the shelves.
Le Friquet(there is no “the” in the address) has NOT stolen anything from its competitors, other garden centres are also open on Sundays but do not necessarily stock the wide range of other goods that they do. if the laws were changed you would see the others also open if they wanted.
Some people tend to forget that Gabriels stayed shut on a Thursday afternoon, it never did them any harm, if the business is a good one there is a thing called loyalty and that is more important than opening or closing hours.
To anyone who says that nothing is “needed” on a Sunday I salute you , it must be great to be perfect and remember everything you require in advance , for the rest of us with normal memory spans etc we can now put you on a pedestal and worship you
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Why is it assumed that Sunday opening means 7 day opening?
Why not open Sunday, close Monday (or whenever)?
It makes sense for shops to be able to open when customers are not working and able to get to the shop.
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Toady, you can get pornography for free.
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@Mr G
I will take that as a comment from someone who knows lol
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Someone says “freedom of choice” It won’t be for employees who don’t want to work tho will it! When sunday trading started in The UK it was not supposed to be compulsory and those who wanted to work got paid extra …. Not any more…. now it’s written into contracts and very few employers will employ people who make it known in an interview that they do NOT want to work Sundays. @Ray, I am one of the owners of our gift shop business and a shop of this sort makes sense to be open on Sunday although if i want to close to spend the day with family i can (that’s the point, an employee working for someone wouldn’t have that choice). To use the excuse open Sundays because in the summer cruise ships visit doesn’t wash because you can get a special licence for the Sundays when cruise ships are in. Rays query about me sending mixed messages because i say i appreciate family values yet work Sundays myself, that’s the point Ray! I’m one of the bosses and if i want to open Sundays I will work myself as I don’t expect our employees to give up their time with family unless they WANT to. People forget we live on a SMALL ISLAND! English Politics and 24/7 trading hours will never work like they do on in the UK which is more suitable for super size stores/malls/mega stores that people seem to think this Island needs. There just isn’t the footfall for it to be cost effective! If u want to shop in huge malls and stores 7 days a week then go and live somewhere bigger and more suited to stores like that. It makes me mad when owners of retail companies etc expect staff to give up family time to work holidays and the likes of Christmas Day and New Years Day but wouldn’t actualy go in themselves. It just boils down to greed at the end of the day. High Street stores have the other 6 days to trade so leave Sundays to the little shops and give them a chance. It’s hard enough for the local little guys as it is!
:-)
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You can’t have it both ways Terry Langlois. You regard any attempt to repeal the daft and unfair Sunday trading laws as an assault on our way of life yet at the same time you doubt if anyone is being forced by the Sunday trading ban to stay closed against their wishes. If repeal would have such a small effect why not allow it to happen and sweep away all those anomalies to create a true level playing field?
Also you have failed entirely to grasp the point I had made about petrol stations and pubs, which is that people like you were saying that allowing pubs to open and petrol to be sold on Sundays would mean the end of the world as we know it. We now know that this was just desperate scaremongering by the status quo brigade and we are hearing exactly the same in the more general Sunday trading debate.
Your post is riddled with contradictions and concludes with the bizarre proposition that allowing full freedom to trade on Sundays is somehow contrary to the wider interests of the community. It is obvious to most that the exact opposite is true in fact.
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Shops are already allowed to open on a Sunday, not all maybe but the real issue is that the current laws are complicated and difficult to enforce and to abide by because of the items that can and cannot be sold, someone mentioned not being able to buy a plant pot but a potted plant was ok. Even if this mess is sorted it’ll be an improvement.
This is not just an issue for somewhere like Le Friquet but for other shops that offer mixed items.
Freedom of choice is the key; If all shops were allowed to open then I’m sure a lot would open at first and after a while those that found it non profitable would not open, for instance not all petrol stations open on a Sunday. Shops could also still open on a 5 day a week basis and close on a Monday. This is common practise in France and I would say the French are probably more of a religious society than we are here.
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If for instance someone say in construction like myself or anyone involved with the HSSD who sometimes by choice, sometimes by necessity of either employers demands or financial demand work 6-7 days a week and only get a chance to shop sunday afternoon and cant, theres only one place to go AMAZON or any other internet/off island website that is cheaper than most stores here anyway. If Laws wont let people make money as and when they choose then money WILL be spent off island.
ps could someone explain why le friquet has to barrier off some areas is it correct that its to do with sunday laws? If so thats mental, do undercover detectives sneak around the shop waiting for unruly staff to sell items out of trading law hours
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@GSYBABYMAKER
Yes indeed you have the right idea about the cordoning off , there are quite a few signs stating exactly that – its ludicrous.
I can buy a live animal from Le Friquet on a Sunday but not a nice piece of scented soap for me to bathe with
If you are shopping solely on Amazon etc then why not do what I do , take a print out of the items you want to buy , they then have the choice to match the price or let you buy from the internet knowing that you are unlikely to ever go to them again. a compromise can usually be found in most cases
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Griffin
Nice to see that you appreciate your own individual freedom of choice on whether to open or not on a Sunday ( albeit under special licence having had your square footage checked in order to comply with this draconian law )
If ever I find myself short of a plastic wind chime or a painted limpet shell on a Sunday I’ll be sure to pay a visit. I suppose a flower pot is out of the question?
However I realise that I must continue to be cautious enough to plan ahead lest I run out of satanic sandpaper or felonious filler on my family’s favourite DIY day
SUSPEND the current dog’s breakfast of a law for a couple of years.Bring it back earlier if, unlike in the case of petrol sales,there is rioting in the streets
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I’ve commented on previous articles that (a) the law is ludicrous and needs changing and (b) there is a degree of validity on both sides of the argument.
Having read all the comments I think Ray is on the right track. My only suggestion would be that we take it further.
Many of us are too young to remember full Sunday trading restrictions so why not have trial periods of both? Let’s try a complete suspension and a return to the “old ways” – then let the people of Guernsey decide which is best for the island.
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I call for a restrictions and special licenses of the sale of cans of diet cola and toblerones on Wednesdays, and the ban of sale of mugs under five inches in height and deodorant on Fridays.
As the sale of such items goes against my lifestyle and if you needed such items on these days you should have thought ahead and brought them the day before, anyone whom wants the sales of said items on these days are lazy! And shout go to england or some other place to purchase these items when the please! If they want that so much as we don’t want england’s liberal agenda ruining guernsey.
Furthermore, it is unfair to expect shops dealing with the sale of said items to force workers to come in on these days to sell these items, the workers should have the choice of when they work and what they sell and how much pay they get and how much holidays and if they feel like coming into work or eating toblerones drinking diet cola from a mug and smelling fabulous on their wednesdays and fridays, as that’s the guernsey lifestyle!
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maybe a surprise to some but shops being open 7 days a week is quite normal,the exodus continues
wake up and smell the coffee
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@P B Falla
Indeed it is my friend, what the people who don’t WANT to work or open a shop on a Sunday don’t realise is that if everybody took the same view we wouldn’t be able to read our newspapers, or even go on that mass exodus you keep talking about.
Can you imagine the uproar if the airport/harbour staff didn’t feel like working on a Sunday ? or the 24 hour gas leak hotline answerphone said ” we regret you might die , but it is a day of rest after all !”
double espresso anyone ?
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How many of You would be happy to work Sundays then? How many of you would be happy with a turkey sandwhich and a curly wurly on Christmas Day instead of having a traditional lunch with your family? How many of you would have to cancel or curb your New Years Eve Parties because you have to work New Years Day?
There is no time for quality time with spouses, families and friends these days, which is probably one of the reasons there are so many divorces and family break ups. Family Should come FIRST, for Gods sake we survived well enough before Sunday opening! And I for one do Not wish to be FORCED to work my Sundays!
I will admit they need to make up their minds about what can be sold and the Friquet needs to decide whether it’s a Garden Center or a glorified gift market because they appear to sell lots of items that you wouldn’t use for garden activites …….or does everyone wear their best designer clothes and costume jewellry while planting shrubs and weeding the rockery?!
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@Sapphire
YES. I would gladly work Sundays , worked them for about 50% of my working life and will be again when my chemotherapy finishes soon. I will gladly swap lives with anyone and work every Sunday for the whole 24 hours right now
Who the heck keeps saying that you will have to work 7 days a week ?, do your family suddenly disappear for the other 6 days a week ?
Forget what goods a shop sells , that’s irrelevant, the fact of it is that they are trying to compete in an ever changing market and most importantly, keeping people in a job, the days of going to one shop for your meat, the next for bread, the next for veg went many years ago with the advent of a supermarket. as I mentioned before if we didn’t have choice the comment would be how rubbish local shops are
If your diary consists of party invites then fantastic for you, I don’t envy you but good for you.
However if anyone ever goes out for Sunday lunch or an Ice Cream at a beach kiosk, or going to Beau Sejour for a swim and sauna while enjoying “family time” please remember this thread. I have no doubt someone will say hotels and bars are different but they are not – its still Sunday trading.
If anyone does not want to possibly work Sundays and have a different day off then possibly retail in all its forms is not the job for you, sorry but times are changing.
There is nothing saying that any business HAS to open, give the business the choice that is all that is being stated. Its already well known that companies such as Asda and Tesco looked into taking over Checkers because of the laws, and in previous forums they are some that apparently everyone wants over here because they think they will save a few pence
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Sapphire – get a grip. There are many people island-wide that are expected to work on a Sunday, bank holiday, after 6pm and all sorts of other ‘unsociable hours’ as their norm. If they didn’t then pretty soon many important elements of the island would grind to a halt.
You do the hours that are required for your chosen vocation and if that means spending a Monday or Tuesday or any other day of the week with your family instead of the sacrosanct Sunday then so be it.
The Sunday trading laws on the island are a complete joke. Either all shops are allowed to open and sell what they sell on a daily basis or none at all. Why should some have a special dispensation just because a cruise ship is in the harbour whilst others cannot. And why are cruise ship passengers deemed to be so much more important for their spending powers than people that actually live, work and pay tax to the island?
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I moved from one sector of employment where it is the “norm” to work all hours that God Sends to retail because i favoured hours that were more consistently worked.
Back when Guernsey was Guernsey the “norm” for retailers was a Sunday off (easier to spend time with others anyway because the majority of families would be off the same day), and a CHOICE to work Bank Holidays.
Maybe i think to much with my heart because i see Guernsey culture and it’s warm friendly people and shops being swallowed up by greedy attitudes and cold policies. How many stores can you honestly say have good friendly smiling staff greeting you and offering you help. ….Now ask yourself how many of those stores are not local….?
I’m not really against Sunday opening in pricipal but it must be fair to people who are going to be expected to work and it should apply across the board including the finance industry (What’s so special about banks anyway not working Sundays and having holidays specifically for their sector)?
People who have worked for non local stores will understand what i’m trying to get at but basically if the Sunday licening policies are abolished in the Island then you can wave goodbye to Guernsey traditions and say hello to “Mini England” There will always be people who will compare us to larger places like the England and people like Karen who will work regardless of what day or time of day it is but that is not what Guersey is about. We are a little Island and we have always been known for our laid back ways and easy going lifestyle so what if we have not got the latest things …we are not a huge city and trying to be one it doesn’t suit this Island!
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Got a little time to kill before I watch United thrash Spurs so I’m trying to think about who would be working in Guernsey this Sunday ….
Hospital staff (P.E.H. and all other hospitals)
Care Home staff,Police,Fire,Ambulance,Prison,Airport fire,Airport security,Weather Station staff,Pilots,Trolley Dollies,Harbour staff,some shop staff of course,Taxis,Bus drivers,TV and radio,Dave Jones,Petrol pump attendants,Hire car staff,Chemist staff (for the permitted hour),the moderator of this forum, Fishermen,Herm and Sark boats staff,Farmers,Bar staff,Newsagents,did I already mention Dave Jones?,Chip Shop staff,Chinese Takeaway staff,Restaurants,Hotels,Guest Houses,Emergency call out teams,Cinema staff,Beau Sejour,Vicars and organists,Teachers preparing for tomorrow?,Museum staff,Golf club staff,Tennis club staff,Social club staff,Condor passenger and freight ferry staff,Power Station staff,Surf school staff,Garden centre staff (one team to serve eager customers and another team to cordon off unlawful items),Supermarket shelf stackers,On line betting staff …. my brain is starting to hurt now so I’ll sign off with apologies to the many I have forgotten to mention
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No Finance people listed Ray! Wow there’s a surprise! While you are listing all these people that work on Sunday, they could equally turn around and say “well Fanny from Finance doesn’t work weekends so lets bring out a law that allows us the same entitlement”!
I think some are missing the point here ….While there is a need to ammend what can and can not be sold,there is no need for High Street retailers and large supermarkets to be open Sundays in Guernsey. The Islands smaller shops can cope quite easily with the demand and it at least gives them a chance to make some money where as if all the larger stores were open,all the who rely on their Sunday trading to survive would die out.
Do you really want to see all small friendly local shops closed down? The excuses that some of you are giving for opening may work really well in a larger towns/cities but like Sapphire pointed out this is a small Island. The Tourism Industry is all but finished over here now and that’s indirectly down to the states focusing on Finance to bring money not visitors to the Island. Everything after that is being done/changed/suggested for the benefit the demands of such an industry and sadly that is going to come at great cost to us locals and our once beautiful Island. :(
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Sapphire
Just as a nod towards your post, I agree with your comments about customer service attitudes.
As one of those people who has to face the public generally can I just add that a lot of the “bad attitude” is possibly caused by customers who complain that a store does not stock their “recommended by Jamie Ramsey” cheese despite there being a choice of 50 other cheeses etc etc etc.
There is two sides to every story obviously ,No one will ever agree to all of it but no one wants to go back to the “good old days of curfew” either
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Maybe we should go back to having all shops closed on a sunday,they have 6 days of the week to trade,at any hour they wish,and some do open till late at night.
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We thrashed them 0-0 but the ref was obviously bent
Griffin
I suppose I could knock up a long list of people who don’t work on a Sunday but that’s not really the point
As far as I’m aware there is no law to prevent Fanny from finance from opening up if she wanted to,but there is a law ( A LAW WITH SEVERE PENALTIES!) preventing Kevin from Quayside or Shirley from Shafeways from serving me with the most mundane items, either because those items are banned under that law or because the tape measure says that while the Longstore Co-Op can sell me a loaf the Bridge Co-Op is far too big to sell me an identical loaf
One day we might all look back and laugh at how stupid this looks in the Twenty First century
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“You do the hours that are required for your chosen vocation and if that means spending a Monday or Tuesday or any other day of the week with your family instead of the sacrosanct Sunday then so be it.”
Karen – the one problem with this point is that children go to school on other days. If parents want to spend a day together with their children, at the moment the only options are either Saturday or Sunday – and for many people Saturdays is a working day.
As I said before there are valid arguments on both sides which is why I think Ray’s (slightly modified) suggestion is by far the best.
Let’s stop this endless bickering and take some positive action – give both extremes a go and see what happens.
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As a middle ground, why not make a minor change ? You need a license to trade on a Sunday ( so we could stop the larger stores opening if we want ) – but once you have a license, you can sell what you want.
Or is that too sensible ?
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All this talk of middle ground and compromise is ridiculous. How can you make any compromise of a dog’s dinner? And if you don’t need a special license to trade on a Monday or a Friday or a Saturday why on earth should you need one for a Sunday? It’s bureaucratic nonsense and the only fair and sensible way forward is to repeal these crazy laws.
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Hi Martino
I think part of the reason why there is so much circular debate on this issue is because many islanders honestly don’t know for certain what the wider impact of radical change would be.
Therein lies the problem. That’s certainly my dilemma, and much as I detest not having a strong opinion either way – apart from agreeing with you that the current law is a dog’s dinner and needs to change – I honestly don’t know which solution is best, and I don’t think I’m alone in this.
That’s why I like Ray’s (slightly modified by yours truly) excellent proposal as it allows us to see the effect first hand and then have a referendum.
It could be that after trialling both options the people of Guernsey realise that full liberalisation is actually not such a bad idea after all. Equally, we may all turn round and think why did we ever begin liberalising the law?
This solution is neither a middle ground or a compromise. It is nothing more than a democratic experiment and one which I think is the best solution for the island. In fact, the only reason I can think to oppose it is fear that the outcome might not meet the expectations of the radical elements – epitomised by your good self on one side and the Seventh Day Adventists movement on the other!
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Hi Paul and happy new year to you. Actually, I’d be happy to see that experiment take place, not that it ever would. Although none of us know what the ‘uptake’ of complete freedom to trade on Sunday would be, I very much doubt if it would result in the levels of Sunday opening we see during the rest of the week – just as when the pubs were allowed to open and the petrol stations on Sundays we didn’t see them opening at the same levels as during the week.
What I am supremely confident of is that if the experiment was allowed to happen it would result in a massive public vote in favour of liberalisation rather than a complete ban. There is also no doubt that what we have at the moment is an unworkable, farcical dog’s dinner.
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I agree with David Cranch’s comment.
Is it so radical for a shop to open both Sunday and Saturday and close say Tuesday and Thursday, as an example ?
At the moment for a working single person or working couple it’s often a mad rush to get to the town shops on the Saturday.
Also Really think a bank ought to open both Saturday and Sunday in terms of it’s service part, i.e. for teller service and shut that part two of the other days. Would perhaps bring more people to use the bank?
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