In a column for the Huffington Post, I’ve asked whether small business outcry over changes to Sunday Trading Laws is justified. From Autumn 2016, prohibitions limiting large stores (with a floor space of over 3,000 sq ft) from opening on Sundays for more than six hours will be lifted – an announcement which has led to claims that this will only see more trade moving to larger stores at the expense of smaller shops. Yet the evidence (research, polls and local borough reports), does not suggest that small businesses will suffer from their larger rivals opening for longer. One Australian study, for example, “found no relationship between the proportion of small retail businesses and the stringency of trading hours regulation in each state”. A fifth of consumers have said they would do more shopping on a Sunday were the changes implemented, meaning more customers for everyone – and another way for bricks-and-mortar stores to compete with online retailers.

And rather than wishing the competition be banned from trading, small business owners – many of whom are disruptive by nature – should view this proposal as an opportunity to find new ways to innovate and outsmart their larger rivals.

Read the whole thing here.