Sunday shopping: The case for and against

In recent years the anomalies in the laws on Sunday trading have become ever more apparent. It is not even the restrictive nature of the 1950 Act which brings it into disrepute, so much as the inconsistencies it allows. You can buy a newspaper on a Sunday but not a card; you can purchase clothes from a market stall, but not from a high street store. And the laws are notoriously difficult to enforce and openly flouted. But maybe this will be changing soon. The National Consumer Council are staunch supporters of a bill which has gone through its second reading in the House of Lords and, at the time of writing, is at the committee stage. This bill aims to amend the laws governing Sunday trading, but with a new government it appears that it will be pushed into the background, only to run out of time. However, there are groups of retailers (who think that unlimited Sunday trading will put up costs) and the union, USDAW, who welcome this set‐back to the bill. Both these groups have well‐grounded reservations about changing the law. In this article, Ann Foster examines the case for Sunday trading.