Retailers call on Ontario to open stores

TORONTO — Ontario’s closure of non-essential retailers in the Toronto area is hindering physical distancing efforts, according to a letter from a consortium of some 50 retailers. In the letter, executives from Canadian Tire, IKEA Canada, Hudson’s Bay Co. and other banners write that they “respect the extraordinary efforts” the Ford government is making in the name of public health.

The measures in Ontario’s “grey zones” of Toronto and Peel Region, however, have not reduced in-store traffic, the letter writers say. Rather, they write, they have “funnelled those shoppers and the corresponding health risk into fewer, increasingly crowded stores within Toronto and Peel, as well as adjacent communities, such as we saw in Vaughan and Markham over the weekend.” The consortium is recommending that retailers deemed non-essential be permitted to open at 25 percent capacity.

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