I am delighted that the Bill will give other families the opportunity to have a shared Christmas experience. Although something of the nature of Christmas day has changed and its importance for the vast majority of people may no longer be one of religious significance, that does not mean that they do not want to preserve something special about Christmas day. I have only one thing to say to the right hon. As the hon. Gentleman knows, I am a supporter of the Bill, but we should not get carried away by our own rhetoric with respect to the shared collective experience of a Christmas day of yore.
Pendulums always swing.
Gentleman will recall that Scrooge would have been unable to have the prize goose delivered to Tiny Tim and his family had the butcher not been open on that day. Gentleman, who makes his point in his usual elaborate and flamboyant fashion. It has already been said this morning that essential services continue on Christmas day. The Bill seeks to give workers providing non-essential services the right to the protection that the House took for granted in previous legislation. Rather than making the case for Christmas day opening, the arguments that we have heard about pilot schemes and so on have underlined the need for legislation to prevent Christmas day trading.