Online deliverance for our milkmen

Commerce and Employment has already ruled out financial compensation for milk retailers, so I would like to suggest a way in which they can be helped at no cost to the States and with benefits for consumers and supermarkets as well.

Supermarkets in Guernsey do not currently offer online shopping with delivery to the door, as is now common in the UK. It is highly unlikely that any retailer could justify the expense of setting up such a scheme for the number of their own customers who would use it.

I would suggest that Commerce and Employment should facilitate and coordinate the creation of an island-wide distribution network, to be operated and owned by those who are presently delivering milk. All supermarkets and other local retailers would be able to accept orders either by phone or via a website and then have the goods delivered through the network by the operator on the round for that address.

By using a range of standard-sized boxes for deliveries, it would be easy to calculate and record the delivery charges that the retailer would pay. Whether the retailer then passed on part or all of the charge to the consumer would be a matter for individual choice, determined by the market forces that C and E places so much faith in.

To get the scheme off the ground, it would probably be necessary for C and E to negotiate a fixed set of delivery fees that would satisfy all concerned but in time it might be possible to allow some freedom, allowing major users to negotiate bulk discounts etc.

By cutting down on the number of car journeys consumers make when shopping, this scheme would help reduce the island's carbon emissions and it would certainly make a change for a States department to tackle a problem by taking action instead of introducing a tax.

BARRIE PAIGE,

La Haute Maison,

GY6 8BP.