Garden Centres
Debate between Baroness Jones of Whitchurch and Lord Fowler(4 years, 7 months ago)
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The Lord Speaker
The Earl of Sandwich. Is he there? No. I call the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch.
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)
My Lords, I agree with previous noble Lords who have spoken that there is no real logic to the Government’s current position on this. Hardware stores can be open but garden centres cannot. On behalf of the 300,000 or so allotment holders in the UK, perhaps I may remind the Minister that, in this time of crisis, we are making a great contribution to feeding friends, neighbours and the local community, and indeed are giving surplus produce to local food charities. So there is an urgent need to free that up. We rely on garden centres to replenish our stocks. I hope that the Minister can give us some guarantee that we will be put at the top of the list in the next stage of the lockdown so that people can have access again.