Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, whether (a) his Department and (b) another department has commissioned independent research on the economic effects of extending Sunday trading hours.

In 2006 Indepen were commissioned by the Department for Trade and Industry to evaluate the economic costs and benefits of extending Sunday Trading hours, a copy of the report can be found on the GOV.UK website.

Neither my Department nor another Department has commissioned independent research since then on the economic effects of extending Sunday trading hours, although, we are aware of recent independent research from the London School of Economics that found evidence of positive impacts in retail on employment and expenditure.