Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what assessment the Government made of the effect on (a) high streets, (b) small businesses and (c) post offices of the temporary changes to Sunday trading laws during the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

The Office for National Statistics analysed the impact of the short term Olympic relaxation of the Sunday trading rules and found that it was not possible to make any inference from the data. They found no definite pattern amongst the growth rates of retail sales and noted that other factors, such as the weather and time of year, will have impacted sales.