Retail Trading Hours Amendment Bill Speech

6764 [COUNCIL - Thursday, 16 September 2010]

HON LYNN MacLAREN (South Metropolitan) [3.16 pm]: I rise to support the Retail Trading Hours
Amendment (Armadale Special Trading Precinct) Bill and the Retail Trading Hours Amendment (Midland
Special Trading Precinct) Bill. I support these bills because local people are asking for these changes and
because I think it a prudent decision on the part of the government to establish trading zones outside the centre of
Perth. I do not believe it to be indicative of our current culture that everybody should have to go to the centre of
Perth for their shopping activities. Also, these bills promote sustainable practice by reducing the amount of
travelling time for those who want to shop on a Sunday.

I do not have the same concerns as those expressed by the previous speakers. Let us face it, consumerism is not
everything. We need to have full lives; we need to have time with our families and friends and to enjoy sport.
We do not have to shop all the time. The whole point to these shopping hours is that they are not compulsory,
but simply available to consumers who choose to take them up. We know that because of extended trading
hours, part-time jobs in the retail sector are likely to increase because of the deregulation of trading hours. Parttime
jobs are about flexibility in life. People can more flexibly organise which hours they will work if they have
a broader choice in hours. This will immediately benefit students or those people with other daytime pursuits or
hobbies because they will be able to work extra hours on the weekend to bump up their incomes. Therefore, this
is about diversity. This is about catering for the diversity in our society that comes with a larger population and
about having the opportunity to fill the fridge with food and—in my case, having recently moved into a new
place and not having had time—to buy furniture. It is about providing flexibility for people to clothe and feed
themselves and to get the basic necessities of life. I do not believe that by extending trading hours we will feed
the machine known as rampant consumerism. I hope that people will see shopping during extended trading hours
as an option and not as the only thing they can do in life.

The amended legislation will permit retailers to open for longer hours; however, opening will not be compulsory.
The extension to shopping hours will benefit working families. We acknowledge the benefits to those who
happen to be in a partnership in which both partners are employed. Extended shopping hours are a huge benefit
to them. The Greens (WA), reflective of the community, have diverse views on deregulation and its potential
impacts. We have quite a bit of research that I will probably refer to in my speech in response to the next bill to
come before us. My support for these bills takes a principled approach based on grassroots decision making
through the support of the locally elected council and what it has asked for, and on a sustainable planning policy
that has identified activity nodes where commercial activity is concentrated in specific locations. I support the
bills.