Council gets ready for non-essential shops to re-open

Published: 10 June 2020

The Council’s Environmental Health Teams have already been working with food premises providing a take away service and are on hand to support all non-essential shops across the District due to open soon.

Government guidance allows non-essential shops to open from next Monday which will include a whole range of retailers with the exception of personal care services such as hairdressers, nail bars and tattooists.

To help businesses work through government guidance around COVID-19 and the documents available at https://www.gov.uk/guidance/working-safely-during-coronavirus-covid-19 a specially prepared checklist from the HSE has been produced to help businesses navigate the guidance and ensure they have covered the key elements.

Once the checklist has been completed and businesses have implemented the necessary controls, they are encouraged to sign and display a statement in their shop windows confirming they are COVID-19 secure having completed the HSE’s Five Steps to Safer Working Together checklist. Customers will then have confidence that they can shop safely which will be good for them and those businesses.

In the first instance businesses can contact the Health and Safety Executive at www.hse.gov.uk or call 0300 003 1647 for advice regarding the five steps. A helpline has been specifically set up to support businesses. They can also seek advice and support from the Council’s Environmental Health teams who will be supporting small businesses while they are out and about in the District or the teams can be contacted at environmentalhealth@cannockchasedc.gov.uk to request advice.

Furthermore, the Council’s Economic Development team is also available to advise on available support and funding and can be contacted at econdev@cannockchasedc.gov.uk

As part of the re-opening of non-essential shops, Cannock Chase Council has been awarded £89,622 by government through its Reopening High Streets Safely Fund open to all local authorities. The Council will be committing this money to marketing promotions to stimulate trade in town centres and to pay for signage required to manage visitors to its town centres to navigate people safely around, as more shops open up.

The government funding is part of a European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) grant which applies from the start of June.