Saturday 17 March 2007

Shopping till you're dropping

It is our privilege and our joy to have Iain Evans as our local member. He works hard at his job, is well-liked. He has to be the Leader of the Opposition, and on top of that he is a nice chap (which is not something you can say about all pollies n'est-ce pas?....forgive me if I lapse into foreign tongues in the next few weeks in trying to bone up for Europe I am falling into a melee of confusion about quelle langue est laquelle...which language is which I mean.. any way back to the Honourable Iain)

He kindly sends out his monthly bulletin to those who ask, and this months is about shopping hours. I personally am a bit surprised that he is advocating a seeming deregulation apart from certain sacred days..Anzac, Easter, Christmas, Good Friday...

Shops he says should be allowed to open when they like. By and large I am in agreement with this but I think there is a lot to be said for having an agreed time when shops do not open. I am totally unconvinced that tourists will think Adelaide is a bigger backwater than Hickory Hoontown simply because they arrive on closing day (or half day closing).

The argument, for me, is not in any way religious. It is about shared time. How are we supposed to promote family and community cohesion when we can't actually get a time when most of us are free. I tire, in fact, of trying to arrange meeting times with groups of people and finding that there is simply no time when everyone is free.....there I go wanting to fill free time with meetings...
Can we not, say, have Saturday afternoon off.Or closing all day Sunday?
By and large Sunday opening is good for big shops and bad for small shops who have little flexibility because their staff is small. Which is why I am surprised that the Liberal champion of small business is so keen on this.
Maybe I don't understand this, but there are other, better things to do in your free time than shop!!
If you click the e-bulletin below it will open in more readable form

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ian Who...?

He does seem like a nice enough guy but I don't think he has leadership qualities.

I have seen him speak a couple of times and he never really seems to engage the audience. He tends to ramble on and run over time without really making his point.

Let's face it, it's only a matter of time before he is asked to shove over for Hamilton-Smith. When that happens he will be remembered for being the least memorable opposition leader in some time I would think.

Stephan Clark said...

I know what you mean. But I actually think he is better than that, it is almost as if he is holding himself back, frightened of getting people off-side. (This is a bit liek Lyn Arnold was in the Laborious party)
Unfortunately you can't do that and unless he smartens up soon (like yesterday) he will indeed be ousted in favour of some Tom, Vick or Marty!