Garret Ahearn (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This Friday is Black Friday, which promotes a huge amount of Christmas shopping, predominantly done online. We see today promotions about buying on Black Friday and they will get greater and greater in number over the coming days. It is the day on which you can get products cheapest, supposedly.If there was ever a year when we should try to promote local shopping, it is this year. The Government has supported businesses throughout the pandemic, over the past 18 months and longer, but there is no greater support that an individual can give than to go into his or her local shop to buy a shirt or book because the money goes back into the community. As attractive as some online offers seem to be in the context of people getting the best sale price they will ever get, much of the time this does not seem to be the case. The prices are put up for a period in order that they can be dropped again for Black Friday. The latter has become a phenomenon in America and there are major sales online in Ireland. The Government needs to do as much as it can to support businesses in small towns such as the one I am from, Clonmel. I accept, however, that Clonmel is actually a fine size. If the Government or the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment could set up a campaign of some kind for businesses that greatly rely on support from their local communities, that would be great. We should encourage people, this year above any other, to shop locally and support local businesses as much as possible and to spend their money in shops in Clonmel and other towns.