Welsh Government Publishes Retail Strategy
Welsh Government Publishes Retail Strategy
Posted on 20 Jun 2022
The 
Welsh Government has published a new strategy for retail which is designed to improve the sector. The strategy outlines how the government will work with trade unions and businesses to regenerate retail and build a sustainable Wales.
These include:
- improving career opportunities within retail, with a commitment to progressively improving pay, terms and conditions beyond statutory minimums, ideally through collective bargaining
- greater job security, particularly in ensuring workers being offered guaranteed hours and sufficient notice of changes in shift patterns.
- retail becoming an exemplar of workforce equality, diversity and inclusion – with proactive steps taken to address under-representation, occupational segregation and pay gaps
- ensuring fair working conditions and a safe working environment, with retail workers having an effective voice in decisions that affect them and their working conditions
- ensuring Wales’ town centres and high streets are thriving, through interventions such as investment, including ‘Transforming Towns’ regeneration investment, support for non-domestic rates and, through the Welsh Government’s Town Centre First approach, making these settings the preferred location for workplaces and services
- addressing skills shortages. Building on the Welsh Government’s Plan for Employability and Skills and in partnership with the sector and trades unions, Ministers are committed to helping to provide the sector with a future-proofed workforce. The plan sets out actions to both upskill existing workers and attract new entrants to the sector
- helping retailers to seize the opportunities of decarbonisation and digitalisation by, for example, reducing their reliance on fossil fuels, minimising the carbon footprint of their supply chains and investing in and maximising the potential use of digital technology.
The Welsh Government has confirmed that they will publish an action plan in the coming months to follow this strategy.