A food store hailed for helping pave the way for Sunday and late-night opening in Britain has closed after being taken over by the Co-op.

Sixteen full and part-time staff at the Alldays store in Warren Road, Woodingdean, are being made redundant or transferred to other Co-op stores.

The closure follows the Co-op's takeover of all 600 Alldays stores throughout Britain.

Co-op chiefs said the shop in Woodingdean was no longer needed as a new Tesco Express was opening a few hundred yards away and another Co-op shop already traded in Warren Way.

The Alldays store, once known as Ghazals, was often targeted by the then-Brighton Council for trading illegally on Sundays.

Former owner George Ghazal was fined small amounts, including £5 for selling a tin of peas on a Sunday in 1978, but still continued to open on Sundays and late into the night.

Petitions from residents supporting the store were handed to MPs, including the then Kemp Town MP, Andrew Bowden, who used it as an example of the need to reform shopping laws.

Mr Ghazal, 67, who ran the shop from 1963 to 1986, said: "I am really sad it is closing. It was a real community store.

"I hope I played some part in the reform of the Sunday trading laws.

"If I was younger and fitter, I would open it up again myself."

Pensioner Peter Stepto, of Baywood Gardens, said elderly residents living at the Brighton end of the village would now have to walk a mile to the nearest Co-op store.

He said: "There has been a food shop on the site for as long as most people can remember. I am angry our local shop has closed with so little warning."

Woodingdean ward councillor Geoff Wells, said: "I warned something like this would happen if the Tesco Express was given the go-ahead."

Fellow councillor Dee Simson, who as a teenager worked at Ghazals, said "Today is a very sad day for Woodingdean."

A Co-op spokeswoman said: "This closure is a one-off. We are not renewing the lease on the building, which was due to expire.

"We are in the process of refurbishing Alldays stores and are spending £500,000 upgrading the stores in St James's Street, Brighton, Saltdean, and Marine Parade and South Street in Worthing."

Monday June 16, 2003