Hungary's Sunday shopping ban to have serious consequences

Hungary’s ruling Fidesz party has said it is backing a proposal by its small ally, the Christian Democrats (KDNP), to introduce a shopping ban for Sundays and holidays, although it said the original draft needs to be modified. RTL cited a survey by think thank GfK, according to which 873,000 people do shopping on an average Sunday.

The Association of Hungarian Shopping Centres fears that Saturday crowds will significantly increase as a consequence of the measure banning almost every store to open on Sunday. “If only 10,000 to 15,000 people who generally do their shopping on Sunday are forced to do it on Saturday, larger malls in Budapest will have to deal with 50,000 to 55,000 shoppers on a Saturday," said Gyula Gyalay-Karpos, president of the association MBKSZ, referring to the huge crowds shoppers will have to put up with.

Attila Prosits, managing director of Westend City Center, pointed out that due to larger crowds parking will be more difficult and queues in shops will be longer too.

The National Trade Association is of the view that it will not be worth even for large malls to open restaurants or cinemas on Sundays, which could force them to lay off at least 20,000 people. The downsizing could affect not only the staff of stores, but also security guards, cleaning staff and information personnel.

György Vámos, Chief Secretary of the NTA said every fifth of the 100,000 people involved in Sunday work will need to be sacked if the KDNP’s proposal is put into effect, from next March as planned.

The television reminded that Economy Minister Mihály Varga had expressed his reservations about the proposal before. RTL inquired at his ministry about his stance now and was told that consultations are still in progress and their main goal is to find a compromise solution with the affected employees and companies.