Covid Christmas: Local shops need our support or they may not survive – Angus Robertson

Given the coronavirus restrictions, the temptation is there for us to do all of our Christmas shopping with big online retailers, but that would be a mistake.

Many of our local shops and businesses depend disproportionately on seasonal purchases and customer traffic to keep themselves afloat.

This is more true this year than ever before. Just as the Scottish Government is trying to find the difficult balance in keeping us safe from Covid-19 and also the economy functioning, we too must try and follow the health restrictions and support local businesses.

According to a new survey, Edinburgh has ranked second highest in the UK for coronavirus rules compliance. This should give consumers confidence when going out that the vast majority of us are responsibly following social distancing rules when using public transport, visiting the shops or going out.

In the coming weeks, we are all going to try as best we can to make preparations for the festive season, buying and sending presents and having safe, scaled-down celebrations, perhaps by joining other family members online.

In these circumstances, we should make a resolution; that as much as possible we should support local businesses, shops and restaurants. Many of them do online orders.

So when doing your Christmas shopping, please support local businesses. It may make the difference between them being able to re-open in 2021 or not.

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