MANDURAH, Australia, Sept. 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Speaking at a media conference at the shopping centre on Friday ISPT spokesperson, Steve Cuzens, announced that ISPT would be campaigning throughout the local election campaign on the issue of trading hours normalisation.

The move is the latest in a long-running push to bring retail trading hours in line with those in the Perth Metro area.

The organisation is also an interest holder in Halls Head and Mandurah Forum. Over the past year they have conducted extensive market research and conducted two petitions, one hard-copy which was presented to Council Members in November 2020 and other digital.

The presented petition, which appeals to bring Mandurah’s shopping hours in line with those of the Perth Metro Area, garnered 635 signatures. The digital petition received over 800 signatures.

Mr Cuzens said that he was looking forward to hearing candidates’ positions on normalised retail trading and vows to continue with the Let’s Open Mandurah campaign until commerce and jobs are no longer being exported to neighbouring precincts.

“We have been fighting for Mandurah’s retail trading hours to be brought into line with Perth’s Metro Area for a long time and we very much feel that we have the backing of Mandurah residents on this matter.

We are currently missing an opportunity to increase economic activity in the City of Mandurah because residents are taking their money to supermarkets and shops outside of the City on Sundays and weekday evenings.”

The research commissioned by ISPT found that some 70% of residents in the City of Mandurah favoured normalising retail hours to Perth metro. The same research highlighted that around 50% of residents in Lakelands had shopped in precincts outside of the City of Mandurah boundary due to the restricted trading hours.