Brian Whittle has welcomed a letter from the Scottish Government confirming garden centres and plant nurseries can operate using mail order as long as they can still maintain safe social distancing for staff.
Since the lockdown began, there has been growing concern from garden centres that they could be forced to destroy thousands of saleable plants because they can’t get them to customers. Some local plant retailers have already begun offering a limited online service and MSP Brian hopes others will follow suit as a first step towards reopening their businesses.
As the lockdown has coincided with the arrival of spring and better weather, gardeners have been clamouring for a way to get hold of seeds, plants and other supplies that would allow them to get on in the garden.
The news for garden centres came as DIY chain B&Q began reopening some of its stores with strict new social distancing measures in place. Not all stores have reopened yet but as footage on social media of queues snaking round car parks has shown, there’s strong demand for DIY supplies.
While welcoming the news for gardeners and home improvement fans, the South Scotland MSP urged the public to be sensible about how they shopped and continue to take social distancing seriously. He also highlighted the advice from the Interim Chief Medical Officer to take care when doing DIY, working with power tools or climbing ladders after reports that hospitals were seeing more people injured in home improvement related accidents.
Brian Whittle MSP said:
“As a gardener myself, I understand how important this time of year is for garden centres and plant nurseries. I’m pleased the Scottish Government has confirmed that garden centres can trade via mail order and online delivery. While it’s no substitute for being able to reopen and allow customers to come and pick their own plants, it’s a step in the right direction.
With more of us likely to be spending more time at home for the coming months, being able to work in the garden or do little home improvement projects are going to be a useful way to stay occupied and I hope when the lockdown measures are reviewed soon we’ll see some steps to make that easier.
That said, we should all be sensible and stick to social distancing whenever we leave the house and take care when doing work at home or in the garden to avoid unnecessary demand on the NHS.”
