Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what guidance can the Government plans to provide to charities, to allow them to operate their charity shops safely during the covid-19 outbreak.

The government is working with the charity sector to support it as it begins to recommence activities in line with government guidance on COVID-19 and social distancing. Alongside other non-essential retail, charity shops are planning to start reopening from 15th June. The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy has published guidance on the reopening of non-essential retail which can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/working-safely-during-coronavirus-covid-19/shops-and-branches. In addition to this, the Charity Retail Association has produced guidance to specifically support the reopening of charity shops which can be found here: https://www.charityretail.org.uk/we-have-published-our-reopening-pack/.