It is Small Business Saturday tomorrow (2 December), when the whole country will be encouraged to do their shopping locally. In fact, the whole month ahead is packed with reasons to shop locally.

When it comes to getting in the festive spirit and buying Christmas gifts, there is more happening on your doorstep than you might think. Take a look for yourself. With fairs, markets and independent traders in abundance during December, none of us who live in the area should miss out on great present ideas, mouth-watering food or family-friendly fun.

As if that wasn’t enough to entice you, there is another imperative that might do. The weeks before Christmas are always a critical time for local traders and, therefore, every pound spent locally contributes to the health of our town centres, our local economy and job market. So there is every incentive for us to support our neighbourhoods by shopping locally. I will certainly be buying Christmas gifts as close to home as possible because it is so important that we support our towns and local economy.

That is the essence of Small Business Saturday on 2 December, which is a national event which seems to get bigger each year. Look out for what is happening in the area and shop local.

Looking slightly further ahead, I wish you all a happy Christmas and best wishes for the new year.

If you have your cameras and phones out over the festive period, why not enter the next Seasons of Ealing photo competition? The autumn competition was fantastic and I’m sure the winter one will be too.