Jayne Dowle: Give public the vote on Sunday trading reforms

Should Sunday opening hours be extended?Should Sunday opening hours be extended?
Should Sunday opening hours be extended?
I'D like to ask a few questions of the 31 rebel MPs who helped to defeat the Government's plans to extend Sunday trading a few questions.

Where, for instance, do they stand on the matter of low pay for shop workers? What are their views on zero-hours contracts? Would they be prepared to stand on the steps of the Palace of Westminster and wave a placard in favour of the rights of retail staff across the world?

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I can only think that these MPs who voted against – including 27 rebellious Conservatives – have the rights and feelings of shop workers uppermost in their hearts. Yet this lot are strangely quiet when there are other issues to debate in Parliament regarding the retail sector.

Many of the same shop workers whom they purport to care so much about are also liable to suffer from terrible job security and questionable employer attitudes towards paying the minimum wage. Only last week the Office of National Statistics published a report which told us that 800,000 people, that’s 2.5 per cent of British workers, are on contracts which don’t guarantee how much they will earn week to week. That’s no good for bringing up a family, or even paying the rent. And the number of workers under such duress is on the increase every year.

Then certain MPs have the temerity to stand up in Parliament and deride ordinary hard-working people for accumulating frightening levels of personal debt. And also, many of these same MPs somehow can’t find the time to support campaigns which aim to outlaw the perfidious reach of loan sharks and pay-day lenders.

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Where are all those concerned voices then? Usually, if a campaigning backbencher manages to secure a debate on such tricky matters at all, the green benches mysteriously empty. Do MPs not realise that ridiculous working hours, inadequate pay, ignored so-called rights and greedy employers and big business squeezing the workers all contribute to a much bigger issue than an argument over opening shops for a few hours more on a Sunday?

Let’s not kid ourselves. It is plain to see that this defeat is a bloody nose for David Cameron and Chancellor George Osborne, who vowed to reform Sunday trading in his post-election Budget last year. In the event, the Commons opposed proposals to allow councils to extend shop opening hours by 317 votes to 286.

The majority against the motion included Labour members who support the ‘Keep Sunday Special’ campaign, presumably on behalf of shop-workers, and Conservatives who seek to turn back the clock to those halcyon days when we all walked to church and spent Sunday afternoon reading improving books.

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However, what the result really represents is a rebellion from right-wingers disgruntled with the leadership, and a nasty trick from SNP members. There’s multi-layered irony here; so much for the Conservatives being the party to incentivise business, so much for this Government’s vow to decentralise government and give more power to local councils and so much for the Scottish members, who already enjoy a much more relaxed approach to Sunday trading in their own part of the United Kingdom.

In Scotland though, workers agree to clock in on Sundays for a guaranteed premium rate of pay. There has been some twisted justification put forward involving protecting the rights of Scottish workers to these enhanced wages, but I wouldn’t put too much store by it. Their intention in rebelling was clear.

Sajid Javid, the Business Secretary, described their behaviour as “childish and hypocritical”. He’s right. And it goes back on a promise that SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon made to not allow her MPs to interfere with the voting on matters which only applied south of the border, under which aegis should also come the NHS, education and foxhunting. It’s known as the West Lothian question – the situation whereby Scottish MPs can vote on motions which affect England, but English MPs cannot return the privilege in the Scottish Parliament.

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I’m sure if you stopped by in any town centre this Sunday and asked shoppers why the West Lothian question and a load of back-biting, point-scoring MPs should interfere with their opportunity to buy things after 4pm, they would mostly look flummoxed. If you told them that these MPs have just messed up their big chance to bring Sunday trading into the 21st century, they wouldn’t be surprised though.

It is clear that the politicians who are supposed to represent our interests are far too tangled up in actual politics to think about what we might want. Every time they are asked to consider reform, self-interest and political brokerage gets in the way.

That’s why I say we should ask the people what the people want. Let’s hold a referendum on a matter which ordinary folk care about. I dare the Government to ask us directly what we think about Sunday trading. The results might surprise those who think they know best.