A COALITION of politicians have urged the government to push through plans to enable councils to decide if large shops should open for longer than six hours on Sundays.

In an open letter to David Cameron, 40 MPs, including Boris Johnson and Thirsk and Malton MP Kevin Hollinrake, and 150 councillors called for the first Sunday trading law update since 1994.

Councillors wanting the law changed include the leaders of North Yorkshire, York, Richmondshire, Ryedale, Scarborough, and Hambleton councils and the Conservative leaders of the authorities for Redcar and Cleveland, Darlington, Sunderland and Northumberland.

The letter states: "Nowadays people rightly expect greater flexibility in all aspects of their lives, and being able to shop when it’s convenient is one such freedom. Our high streets have been left trying to compete with 24/7 online shopping."

The call over permitting shops with more than 280 square metres of floorspace to trade for more than six hours between 10am and 6pm on Sundays follows Business Secretary Sajid Javid saying it could help high streets compete and shop workers' rights not to work on Sundays would be protected.

It also comes after a report by the British Infrastructure Group found the move could boost the economy by £1.4 billion annually and employment by more than seven per cent.

North Yorkshire County Council leader Councillor Carl Les said the Sunday trading law "needed to reflect society".

He said: "If people want to have faith, go to church and have a day of rest that will happen, but there are a lot of people who want to use that day to go shopping."

Shoppers at Tesco in Thirsk today (Sunday, February 21) said they liked the idea of having greater flexibility of when they shopped, on what studies have found is the second busiest trading day of the week.

Peter Quinn, of Helperby, said: "I'm not a card-carrying church-goer and I like the idea, as long as it doesn't affect shop staff who do not want to work on Sundays."

The call has sparked opposition from workers' leaders, with shop workers' union Usdaw claiming the move to devolve Sunday trading decisions to councils was "undesirable and unworkable".

Church leaders said they feared the move would disrupt family life.

In 2012, when the government relaxed Sunday trading laws during the Olympic Games, the then Dean of Durham, the Very Reverend Michael Sadgrove, said any move to make the change permanent should be resisted vigorously.

He added: "This supposed public appetite for shopping is being elevated almost to the level of a human right."