€810m price tag on NI shopping

CROSS-BORDER shopping cost the Irish exchequer €810 million last year, equal to 3.5% of the retail market.

Shopping in the North was up 25% last year compared with 2008 with a quarter of a million households in the Republic now doing their grocery shopping in locations such as Newry and Belfast.

In a further blow to the Irish economy, 10% of the Republic’s off-licence business migrated to the North last year.