Sunday shopping
Sunday shopping refers to the ability of retailers to operate stores on Sunday, a day that Christian tradition typically recognizes as the Sabbath, a "day of rest". Rules governing shopping hours, such as Sunday shopping, vary around the world but some European nations continue to ban Sunday shopping. Sabbatarian Christians who observe Saturday as the Sabbath oppose such laws.
Sunday shopping by country
Australia
The situation in Australia is not uniform, as each of its States and Territories has its own different laws. Historically, shops closed for the weekend on Saturday afternoons, with South Australia being the first state to allow Saturday afternoon opening. Most states now allow Sunday opening, with unregulated trading in Victoria, Tasmania and the Northern Territory.
Certain shops are generally made exempt, or partially exempt, from trading hours laws (including restrictions on Sunday trading) under certain conditions. Shops that are not exempt from trading hours restrictions are referred to as "general" or "non-exempt" shops. Although these vary from state to state, generally speaking, exemptions can be based on one or more of the following:
New South Wales
Trading hours in New South Wales are largely deregulated following the enactment of the Shop Trading Act 2008, which commenced operation on 1 July 2008.
Under the current act, Sunday trading is unrestricted; however, shops must close on Good Friday, Easter Sunday, Christmas Day, Boxing Day, and until 1:00 p.m. on ANZAC Day, unless exempted. Exemptions are granted generally by virtue of small size, location, types of goods traded; other shops must apply for an exemption to trade on a restricted day through the Department of Industrial Relations.
Prior to these laws, shops not generally exempted were required to apply to trade on Sunday and other public holidays, to be granted if the shop was "serving predominantly the tourist or visitor trade, significant public demand or operates in a holiday resort area". In practice however, Sunday trading remained commonplace.
Victoria
Trading hours are deregulated in Victoria; shopping is allowed at any time, except for Anzac Day morning (before 1 p.m.), Good Friday and Christmas Day. Victoria is also famous for first introducing round the clock 36 hour shopping before Christmas, even if this fell on a Sunday. In Victoria Boxing Day is also one of the busiest days of the shopping year, and many stores are opened extended hours even if it falls on a Sunday. Victoria is one of only a select number of states which feature 24hr Kmart stores, open every day of the year except for Christmas Day.
Queensland
Non-exempt shops in Queensland are permitted to trade from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. and from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. in certain coastal towns north of Brisbane. Permission for regional cities to trade on Sundays is made by the local council that governs it.
South Australia
South Australia introduced Sunday trading for non-exempt shops in 2003. Non-exempt shops are restricted to opening between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. in the Adelaide metropolitan area. Trading hours are also restricted in a number of "Proclaimed Shopping Districts" in country South Australia, where non-exempt shops must remain closed on Sunday. Local governments can apply to have their Proclaimed Shopping District altered or abolished.
Western Australia
Trading hours in the Perth metropolitan area - and generally, south of the 26° South line of latitude - are regulated through the Retail Trading Hours Act 1987. Unless exempted, general retail shops in the Perth area must remain closed on a Sunday or public holiday.
Exemptions to allow continuous Sunday trading in the Perth area began in 1996, which permitted general shops in the central precincts of Perth city and Fremantle to trade between noon and 6 p.m. Further legislation in 2006 identified prescribed areas of Rockingham, Rottnest Island and Wanneroo as "holiday resorts" to be treated as tourism precincts for exemption. In 2007, the Perth Sunday trading precinct was enlarged to take in adjoining suburbs such as Victoria Park, Leederville, Subiaco and South Perth. On 8 July 2010, Sunday trading was extended to Joondalup, and on 1 November, to Armadale and Midland.
As of 2010, trading in these "Special Trading Precincts" is allowed on a Sunday between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m., and on a public holiday between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. General shops must remain closed on Christmas Day, Good Friday and the whole of ANZAC Day, or as otherwise directed (for instance, New Year's Day 2011). Outside the Perth metropolitan area, general shops are closed by default, but councils are permitted to make an application for Sunday trading on behalf of their local government area.
Exemptions also apply to small shops (permitted to open 24 hours), filling stations (24 hours, but restricted in types of goods after non-exempt trading hours), and to so-called "special retail shops" which are "considered necessary for emergency, convenience or recreation goods" (until 11:30 p.m.). In late 2010, the Barnett-led state government sought discussion on extending an exemption to permit retailers of "'whitegoods' and certain other 'bulky' or 'consumer durable' goods" to trade on Sundays.
In 2005, Western Australian voters were asked to vote in a referendum on extended trading hours on week-nights and Sundays, coinciding with the state election of that year. Both questions—which proposed trading until 9:00 p.m. on week-nights, along with six hours of trading on Sunday—were firmly rejected, with only 38.6% of those voting in the referendum supporting the Sunday trading proposal.
Tasmania
Trading hours in Tasmania have been deregulated since December 1, 2002, with shops only being required to close on Christmas Day, Good Friday, and ANZAC Day morning. Previously, businesses with more than 250 employees were not permitted to trade on Sundays. This restriction can be gazetted by the relevant minister for these shops, but only on the advice of a local council, and only after a referendum of voters in that local government area is carried.
Australian Capital Territory
Trading hours in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) have been deregulated since the repeal of the Trading Hours Act 1996 on 29 May 1997. The 1996 act restricted trading of "large supermarkets" to between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. on Sundays, provided other trading hours were not gazetted by the relevant minister. Large supermarkets were those with greater than 400m in floor area, and located in the City or the Belconnen, Woden and Tuggeranong Town Centres.
Belgium
Shops in Belgium may open on Sunday afternoons. In March 2006 the number of Sunday opening days increased from three to up to nine. Six of these are determined by the federal government and three may be determined by municipalities. In addition the criteria which a municipality must meet to be recognised as a "tourist centres" were relaxed. There are also arrangements for food stores to open on Sunday and wider arrangements for Sunday opening of certain sectors such as furniture and do-it-yourself stores and garden centres.
Canada
In 1982, the Supreme Court of Canada upheld the Lord's Day Act. However, at that time, only the Canadian Bill of Rights existed. That document only protected existing Canadian rights. As a result, the Court noted that Canada was an overwhelmingly Christian country that had accepted Sunday closing laws for years. The Court determined that the Lord's Day Act did not force people to practice Christianity or stop practicing their own religion.
However, later that year, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms was introduced, ensuring freedom of conscience and religion, regardless of existing federal or provincial laws. On April 24, 1985 - the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Lord's Day Act violated Canadians' freedom of religion. The 1985 ruling examined the original purpose of the act. It found that the Christian value of keeping the Sabbath holy had been incorporated into a law that affected all Canadians, Christian or not. This law—the Lord's Day Act—prevented non-Christians from performing otherwise legal activities on Sundays. This was inconsistent with the Canadian charter.
Nova Scotia
Until October 4, 2006, Nova Scotia was the only province in Canada that prohibited year-round Sunday shopping. An experiment with the practice was held in 2003 and in 2004 a binding plebiscite was held which resulted in 45% of voters in favour of Sunday shopping and 55% voting against the practice. The Retail Business Uniform Closing Day Act allowed some stores, such as video rental outlets, pharmacies and book stores, to open on Sundays, but department stores had to remain closed. The restrictions were based on the area of a store and its form of business.
By mid-2006, several grocers in Nova Scotia including Pete's Frootique and larger chains such as Atlantic Superstore and Sobeys circumvented the law by reconfiguring their stores on Sundays into separate businesses, each of which was small enough in area to be exempt from the Retail Business Uniform Closing Day Act. For example, a Halifax-area Sobeys location was known as the "Sobeys Queen Street Mall" and housed the Sobeys Retail Fish Store Ltd., Sobeys Fruit Stand Ltd., Sobeys Bakery and Bulk Food Ltd. and eight other separate "businesses".
On June 23, 2006, the Premier of Nova Scotia, Rodney MacDonald, announced new limits on Sunday shopping as a means to honour the wishes of voters in the 2004 plebiscite. The proposed new regulations prohibited grocers and other retailers from opening if they reconfigured their businesses as separate operating units after June 1, 2006. The premier also announced that he would seek the views of the public in a new plebiscite to coincide with municipal elections scheduled for 2008.
On July 2, 2006 members of the Halifax Regional Police entered the Barrington Street Atlantic Superstore in Halifax with measuring tapes and began an investigation to see if the grocer was in compliance with the Retail Business Uniform Closing Day Act. Three days later, on July 5, 2006, Sobeys filed a motion in the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia to have the Retail Business Uniform Closing Day Act and the new regulations announced by Premier MacDonald to be declared invalid. Sobeys was joined by Atlantic Superstore in the case, who entered by seeking intervener status.
Sobeys felt that the law was unjust since it permitted competitors such as Pete's Frootique in Bedford to open Sundays. Pete's Frootique had taken the provincial government to court seven years earlier and won the right to open on Sundays with its separate operating divisions, thus it was "grandfathered" in the new regulations announced by Premier MacDonald.
On October 4, 2006, the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia ruled that the Government of Nova Scotia had over-stepped its authority by forcing the supermarkets to close. In response, Premier Rodney MacDonald announced that effective Sunday, October 8, Sunday shopping would be an unrestricted option open to all retail stores, and can be open on all holidays except Remembrance Day, for which there was a separate provincial law forcing all businesses to close. Since then, Sunday shopping has been adopted throughout the province.
Ontario
After the demise of the Lord's Day Act, the Retail Business Holidays Act of Ontario still prohibited most stores from opening on Sundays. However, there were many exceptions to these rules (for example, gas stations, convenience stores, tourist areas). Many store owners who opposed the law decided to open their stores on Sundays, knowing they were breaking the law.
In June 1990, the Supreme Court of Ontario found the act to be unconstitutional. As a result, Ontario had nine months of open-wide Sunday shopping, until the Ontario Court of Appeal's reversal of the decision in March 1991.
However, public opposition to Sunday closing continued to rise. Bowing to public pressure, the Rae government amended the Retail Business Holidays Act in June 1992 to permit Sunday shopping in Ontario.
Other Canadian Provinces
Several other provinces have restrictions of some degree on Sunday shopping.
In Prince Edward Island, it is only permitted after 12 noon from the Sunday before Victoria Day until Christmas Eve. This was repealed on November 25, 2010, allowing stores to open at any time on Sunday year-round.
In Manitoba it requires municipal approval and it is only permitted from 12PM to 6PM each Sunday.
In New Brunswick the decisions require dual approval from municipal and provincial officials (although that is in the process of being changed), otherwise it is only permitted from August to the First Sunday in January. Some cities (such as Saint John and Fredericton) restrict Sunday hours to 12PM to 5PM.
In British Columbia, most liquor stores are closed on Sundays.
In the 1990s, Quebec allowed wide-open shopping from 8AM until 5PM; some stores (mainly supermarkets) could remain open later than 5PM, but they could not have more than four employees on staff after 5PM. The law was changed in the 2000s to allow supermarkets to remain open until 8PM with an unlimited number of employees.
Other provinces allow wide-open shopping all day on most Sundays (except when it falls on a holiday or when objected by municipalities).
Croatia
The Roman Catholic Church and some other minor organizations tried to influence the Croatian Government in order for Sunday shopping to be banned. Although it had worked for some time, the Croatian Constitutional Court declared banning Sunday shopping to be unconstitutional, and on April 28, 2004 issued a decision making it legal. The Church admitted defeat in the battle over closing shops on Sundays. However, on July 15, 2008, the Parliament of Croatia, again under pressure from the Catholic Church, passed a new-old law banning Sunday shopping effective January 1, 2009. However, this new ban was also declared to be unconstitutional by the Croatian Constitutional Court on July 19, 2009 [2] and the Catholic Church admitted defeat once again [3].
European Union
A Conference on Sunday protection at European level was held in March 2010 in the European Parliament in Brussels. It was organised by the MEPs Thomas Mann (EPP, Germany) and Patrizia Toia (S&D, Italy) together with the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. Several European trade unions, civil society organisations and churches attended the conference. László Andor, the EU Commissioner for Employment and Social Affairs, responsible for a new draft of the Working Time Directive, addressed the conference.
The following European Union countries currently allow shops to open every Sunday: Sweden, Finland, UK, Ireland, Czech Republic, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Slovakia, Romania, Slovenia, Portugal, Bulgaria and Hungary. The following European Union countries currently allow shops to open every Sunday on tourist declared towns and cities and currently have a very extensive list of them that includes capitals and major cities: Spain, France, Netherlands and Italy (country on which restrictions remain only at certain non touristic areas of the north).
Finland
As of December 2009, opening hours, including Sunday shopping, for stores with a commercial floor area of less than 400 m are unregulated. The current law permits even the largest retailing venues to stay open on Sundays from 12 pm to 6 pm (12:00 - 18:00), and during the Christmas shopping season beginning on the third Sunday of November and ending on December 23, to 9 pm (21:00). Sunday shopping was introduced in 1994.
France
France laws about Sunday shopping are complex. Although Sunday shopping is generally not allowed, there are many exceptions such as certain zones and municipalities of the metropolitan areas of Paris, Marseille, and Lille; as well as around 500 cities that were declared as tourist towns, including major cities such as Nice, Le Havre, Bordeaux, etc. Most major stores nationwide open every December Sunday prior to Christmas. Supermarkets (but not Hypermarkets) are allowed to open nationwide every Sunday morning until 13:00 for grocery shopping. The 2009 relaxation allowed all stores to open in tourist areas (before, only sports, toys and cultural shops were allowed). The most visible result is that now clothing stores open every Sunday on places such as Champs Elysees in Paris, La Défense, and downtown Nice.
In 2008, the furniture chain IKEA was fined €450,000 (over $700,000) for trading on Sundays under the law of 1906. With the current law, IKEA stores are allowed to open every Sunday. However only the ones on the Paris metropolitan area actually do so.
Germany
In Germany, opening hours have long been restricted through the Ladenschlussgesetz. The 1956 law required shops to close for the weekend at 2 p.m. on a Saturday and 6:30 p.m. on week-nights, with opening until 6 p.m. on the first Saturday of the month, in what was known as the Langer Samstag, or "long Saturday". The law was changed, in the face of strong resistance from labour unions, to allow langer Donnerstag ("long Thursday") until 8:30 p.m. in 1988, and in 1996 opening times were extended to 8 p.m. from Monday to Friday and 4 p.m. on Saturday; this was extended to 8 p.m. on Saturday in 2004.
In 2004, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled against lifting restrictions on Sunday opening, which is still confined to some small bakeries and convenience stores inside railway stations and airports. However, in 2006, the responsibility for opening hours was transferred to the state governments instead of the federal government, leading to an end to regulated Monday-Saturday opening hours in several states, such as Berlin. However, there is still strong resistance to Sunday shopping from churches and politicians. The leadership of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern has expressed an interest in allowing Sunday shopping.
Hong Kong
While Sunday is a holiday or day of rest, shopping hours are not regulated and decided wholly by store owners. Most of the shops open on Sunday from 10-11am to 10-11pm.
Republic of Ireland
There has been no recent legislation regarding Sunday trading in the Republic of Ireland, which is regulated by the Shops (Hours of Trading) Act, 1938. However, the act itself is largely inoperative, and as a result most shops and businesses may open whenever they please, including on Sundays and public holidays.
Major retail chains (such as supermarkets, department stores, stores that specialise in DIY, household goods, clothing, etc.) and many independent retailers open their branches throughout Ireland on Sundays usually from 10:00 to 19:00 in the larger towns and cities and from 12:00 to 18:00 in the smaller centres. In Dublin, almost all shops are open on a Sunday.
Supermarkets, convenience stores and petrol stations are open longer hours than other shops on Sundays, typically from early morning (06:00-10:00) to late evening (20:00-00:00).
Some supermarkets, such as Tesco, are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Many smaller shops, most petrol stations, some food service outlets, and other retailers, such as pharmacies, are also open permanently - particularly in Dublin.
Netherlands
In the Netherlands, all communities are (in principle) allowed to open shops for twelve Sundays a year. However, in the Christian-dominated Bible Belt area, little use is made of this due to severe pressure from conservative Christians claiming Sunday as a day for worship only. The law provides for touristic municipalities (including major cities such as Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague) to allow shops to open on Sundays year-round. The law at first did not include a definition of what constituted "touristic", resulting in what Christian and socialist political parties called "misuse of the tourism provision": non-touristic municipalities branding themselves "touristic" in order to allow year-round Sunday shopping. In November 2010 the upper house of parliament voted in favour of legislation defining conditions under which communities can call themselves "touristic".
A Sunday on which shops are opened is known as a koopzondag in Dutch, literally "buying Sunday".
New Zealand
New Zealand, which banned trading on Saturday and Sunday completely between 1945 and 1980, liberalised shopping hours in 1990. Shops may open at any time, with the exception of all day Good Friday, Easter Sunday, and Christmas Day, and before 1:00pm on ANZAC Day. Certain types of shops, such as petrol stations and dairies, are specifically excluded from this restriction and are still allowed to trade on these days. However, outside the main cities, shops still close for the weekend on Saturday afternoons.
Norway
In Norway only gas stations, flower nurseries and food shops that are smaller than 100 m2 (square metres) are allowed to operate on Sundays. For special occasions such as Christmas shopping there are exceptions.
Spain
Commercial liberalisation during the 80's allowed Sunday shopping with no restrictions. However, due to pressure from the small independent shops, certain restrictions were introduced in the 90's. Currently, each autonomous community may establish its own Sunday opening calendar. The general trend is to allow Sunday opening once a month (usually the first Sunday) and every Sunday during special shopping seasons (including Christmas and sales). Certain sectors (including bars, restaurants, bakeries, pharmacies, fairly big convenience stores, small family-run stores, and bookshops) are granted an exception and may open every Sunday with no restrictions. It's not hard to find a small grocery store open on Sunday on any Spanish town as of 2011.
Religious concerns have been notably absent from the debate. The main bone of contention lies in the competition between big department stores, supermarkets and shopping centers, who push for complete liberalisation, and small family-run shops, who cannot afford extra staff to open on Sundays.
Shops on towns and areas declared as touristic are allowed to open every Sunday. The list as of 2011 is quite extensive as it includes downtown Madrid, most of the Catalan coast area (except Barcelona), most of Murcia coast towns area, as well as many municipalities on the Madrid metropolitan area, Andalusia coast area and Valencia coast area. Shopping malls and hypermarkets on that areas usually stay open every Sunday.
Sweden
There is no law restricting the opening hours of shops. The only exception to this rule is the government-owned liquor store monopoly Systembolaget, which is not allowed to open on Sundays, and have to close at 8pm on weekdays and 3pm on Saturdays.
Switzerland
Federal labour law in Switzerland generally prohibits the employment of staff on Sundays. The law provides for exceptions for very small shops, shops in certain tourist areas as well as shops in major train stations and airports. The latter provision was adopted in a 2005 popular referendum in which it was opposed by labor unions and conservative Christian groups. Moreover, the cantons may allow shops to open on up to four Sundays a year.
Pursuant to an ordinance of the Federal Department of Economic Affairs, the following train stations and airports are allowed to include shops that are open on Sundays: Aarau, Baden, Basel SBB, Bellinzona, Bern, Biel, Brig, Chur, Frauenfeld, Fribourg, Geneva, Lausanne, Lugano, Lucerne, Neuchâtel, Olten, Schaffhausen, Solothurn, St. Gallen, Thun, Uster, Visp, Wil, Winterthur, Zug, Zürich Enge, Zürich Hauptbahnhof, Zürich Oerlikon, Zürich Stadelhofen; Bern Airport, Geneva Cointrin International Airport, Lugano Airport, Sion Airfield, St. Gallen-Altenrhein Airport, Zürich Airport.
United Kingdom
England and Wales
Sunday trading in England and Wales was not generally permitted until 1994. This meant that shops such as department stores and supermarkets were not able to open legally. A number of specialist outlets were able to open legally, including garden centres, small "corner" or family-run shops, and chemists.
An earlier attempt by Margaret Thatcher's government to allow Sunday shopping in 1986 was defeated in Parliament, with opposition coming from Conservative MPs who saw it as a threat to family life and church attendance, and Labour MPs who were concerned about workers' rights. This led to the formation of the Keep Sunday Special campaign, backed by church groups and USDAW, the trade union representing shop workers.
Several large retailers challenged the legal ruling in force before 1994 by opening on Sundays (or simply ignored them, since the fines were far lower than their Sunday profits), and the outcome was that the Sunday Trading Act 1994 permitted large shops (those with a relevant floor area in excess of 280 square metres) to open for up to six hours on Sunday between the hours of 10 am and 6 pm. Small shops, those with an area of below 280 square metres, are free to set their own Sunday trading times.
However, some large shops, such as off-licenses, service stations and garages, are exempt from the restrictions. Christmas Day and Easter Sunday have been excluded as trading days. This applies even to garden centres, which earlier had been trading over Easter. In 2006, the government considered further relaxation of the permitted hours of business but decided that there was no consensus for change, although a popular poll indicated differently. Some local councils require official permission before allowing a store to open on Sundays.
Since the 1994 Act allowed stores to open, stores seem to keep to it meticulously, perhaps more so than before when they were flagrantly breaching the law by opening at all. However, there is a tendency to open half an hour earlier but not allow sales before the allotted time, to allow people to "browse" and thus effectively extend the opening hours of the store without breaking the law. For example in Birmingham in 2005 several stores opened seven hours, 10.30am-5.30pm, but would not have been able to sell throughout that time without breaking the law.
Scotland
Sunday trading laws in Scotland are devolved to the Scottish Parliament.
Scotland has never had any general legislation regarding Sunday trading. However, the Sunday Working (Scotland) Act 2003 prohibits shops from compelling their workers to work on Sunday. This lack of restriction allows opening hours of larger shops to be longer than in England and Wales, and many large supermarkets remain open seven days a week with little or no adjustment of opening hours at the weekend. There is no equivalent to the legal restriction on Easter Sunday opening that exists in England and Wales, but opening on Christmas Day is very unusual.
Actual practice varies across the country according to local custom and local council regulation. In the Western Isles, where the Free Church of Scotland has a considerable following, there has been virtually no commercial activity on Sundays until recently. In most places the majority of shops which do not sell groceries or newspapers do not as a matter of course open on Sunday; in tourist and holiday areas there is typically an increase in the number of shops opening late and on Sundays during their particular tourist seasons.
Former restrictions include:
Northern Ireland
In Northern Ireland, Sunday shopping is regulated under the Sunday Trading (Northern Ireland) Order 1997. Opening hours are more limited, usually between 1pm and 6pm. This was to create a greater gap between Sunday services and the opening of large shops, in response to objections from churches, which have more influence than in the rest of the UK. Pubs were not allowed to open on Sunday in Northern Ireland until 1989. These laws make Belfast one of the few capital cities in Europe to have absolutely no 24 hour shops in its city centre.
United States
Nearly all stores in the United States have reduced hours of operation on Sundays in some form or another. A few local municipalities still prohibit Sunday shopping. Depending on local jurisdictions and ordinances, many bars and restaurants are prohibited from opening until in-between 11 AM and 1 PM in regard to selling alcohol. Most retail stores (except where prohibited) are open from 11 am - 12-noon to 5 - 7 pm on Sundays. One notable exception to the rule of reduced hours on Sundays is Walmart—almost all of its locations keep the same hours on Sunday as on other days of the week (unless restricted by local law, as in North Dakota), which in many cases is 24/7.
One of the last major areas to completely prohibit Sunday shopping is Bergen County, New Jersey. This area contains one of the largest and most popular commercial shopping cores of the New York metropolitan area (for example, one of four local IKEA stores is found here, the store is the only one in the United States to be closed on Sunday, and is also home to four large shopping malls). Ironically, the area is not considered to be particularly very religious compared to the U.S. population at large, and it also has significant Jewish and Muslim populations whose observant members would not be celebrating the Sabbath on Sunday. Attempts to repeal the law have failed as many locals either like to keep the law on the books as a protest against the growing trend of increased Sunday shopping activity in American society or fear the potential increase of Sunday traffic on major local roads such as Route 4 or Route 17. Some local Orthodox Jews who are off both days of the weekend have complained about the law because it limits their ability to get shopping done on the weekend without having to travel to a neighboring county as religious beliefs prohibit shopping on Friday night or on Saturday before sunset, which in the summer can be right before most department stores and malls close.
Three states (Connecticut, Indiana and Georgia) still prohibit retail alcohol sales in stores on Sundays in a measure which has ties to blue laws. The rest of the United States have repealed such laws. In those three states, however, alcohol can still be served in restaurants and bars on Sunday at the discretion of a county or city along with local ordinances to abide by. For instance in Georgia, most of the Metro Atlanta area counties serve alcohol at restaurants and bars, but the establishments must have a certain amount of food sales in order to be opened and serve alcohol on Sundays. Yet many of Georgia's rural counties and some outer metro Atlanta counties such as Barrow County remain completely dry on Sundays. In those counties on Sundays, bars are closed, and restaurants are allowed to operate but are prohibited from serving alcohol. There was discussion in the Georgia legislature in the late 2000s to repeal the state's blue laws regarding Sunday retail alcohol sales in a measure to increase tax revenue. However then-Governor Sonny Perdue said that he would not sign the bills repealing the laws if they passed in Georgia's state house and senate. Some states also prohibit car dealerships from selling vehicles on Sunday.
See also
References
External links
- UK Opening Hours - a directory of UK Shopping Time
- Findur - Opening Hours for Ireland
- Against
- For
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