MFI,Woolworths who is next ?

[Norman Potting]

My memories of day trips to France are mainly via the Newhaven-Dieppe route. The ferry used to get into Dieppe at something like 11:55. At which point every damn supermarket in Dieppe would promptly shut for a two hour lunch break :thud:

Have spent the last five summer holidays in France and it is only in the holiday areas that the Hypermarkets open on a Sunday and then only in the morning. Intermarche supermarket chain still shut for lunch 1200-1400.

Town centres are generally ghost towns on a Sunday and on Monday mornings (most shops seem to close then as well). However many shops, although they take a long lunch, stay open until 1900 or thereabouts and I noticed that more are actually opening "sans interrupte" (ie not shutting for lunch) whilst still shutting late.

And civilisation doesn't grind to a halt because of it. Shopping in the UK for as much and as long as possible does seem to be a national obsession, and, ignoring any religious views on the subject (which I don't have) I do wonder why. Why does Scotland have different Sunday trading lawsl despite being perceived as more religious?

Remind me what this thread was originally about!

 

[Cian]

Set up an opinion poll for their staff-I'm sure you'll get enough reasons for them to stay closed.

99% of which will be religion based or "its a day for the family" based...

When I worked in BT they never had problems getting enough staff to *volunteer* to work Christmas Day. There was quite a lot of extra money on offer and there are many people who would quite like to be able to treat it as a normal day.

Over here the Sunday trading laws were shredded in the 1980s and theres been no ill effects from it. You're not forced to pre-plan for every possible eventuality and need knowing that absolutely everything is available any day - or any time seeing as theres 24 hour supermarkets/pharmacies/newsagents all over. I don't see why any one day should be demarcated as different to the rest.